Can acupuncture help improve bladder function in spinal cord injury?

Now, before you get all excited by the headline, let us be crystal clear: this article is not suggesting that acupuncture will cure the function of bladder in individuals with a spinal cord injury. Now that we got that out of the way, researchers in China at the First Affiliated Huai’an People’s Hospital of Nanjing Medical University have discovered that acupuncture in combination with intermittent catheterization alleviates neurogenic bladder dysfunction caused by traumatic spinal cord injuries . The study found significant improvements in bladder capacity, residual volume, urinary flow rate, urinary volume, and detrusor pressure following this combined treatment approach.

A total of 80 patients with traumatic spinal cord injuries were recruited for the study, representing lumbar, thoracic and cervical injuries. You can read the complete study HERE.