Inhibitory effect of acupuncture on the vibration-induced finger flexion reflex in man

Experiments were performed on 12 young and healthy subjects. The palmar side of the index finger was vibrated with a triangular wave form at randomly changed inter-stimulus intervals. This vibratory stimulation elicited a flexion movement of the index finger, which was depressed by acupuncture at 'Wai-Kuan.' It was generally observed that the depressive effect developed slowly and lasted for a long time. The depressive effect of acupuncture on this reflex was analyzed using a cross-correlation between the vibratory stimuli and motor unit spikes recorded from the flexor digitorum communis muscle. Cross-correlograms revealed two types of reflex responses. One of them showed a peak of time-locked spikes to the vibratory stimuli at a latency of 25 msec, which indicates monosynaptic activity of the motoneuron, and also showed time-unlocked spikes distributed in both sides of the peak, which implies polysynaptic activity. This type of response was frequently observed and was supposed to be elicited by the proprioceptive tonic vibration reflex. The other revealed no peaks, which indicates that only time-unlocked spikes to the stimuli are generated, and that these spikes are evoked via polysynaptic pathway. This type of response was supposed to be elicited by so-called exteroceptive vibration-induced finger flexion reflex. Since both types of reflex responses, i.e., mono- and polysynaptic ones, were equally depressed during acupuncture, it was concluded that the excitability of the motoneuron, a common output of this reflex, is lowered by acupuncture.