Effective conditions of electroacupuncture stimulation for suppressing tooth pulp-evoked jaw-opening reflex in the...

The effects of electroacupuncture (EA) on the rat jaw-opening reflex elicited by tooth pulp stimulation were studied to decide the effective stimulus conditions for electroacupuncture stimulation (EAS). The present study revealed that one of the most important factors for producing a strong EA effect was the stimulus pulse-frequency and that the stimulus pulse-duration was not an essential factor for this effect. In the rat, the following stimulus conditions were very useful for the quantitative study of the EA effect. (1) Stimulation time is 15 min. (2) Stimulus pulse-frequency is 30 to 150 Hz. (3) Stimulus pulse-duration is 0.1 to 5 ms. When the EAS was applied to the Ho-Ku point under these conditions, the degree of the suppression of the jaw-opening reflex was about 50% of the control.