Treating Infertility with Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine
Boyd Bailey, L.Ac., and Keoni Teta, L.Ac.

Infertility rates have dramatically risen in the past couple of decades, largely due to delayed childbearing, mounting stress, environmental contaminants (hormonal disrupters), and diet, exercise, and lifestyle degradations. This year more than 9 million U.S. women will seek help through conventional Western medicine, and utilize one of several Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART), including hormonal therapies, IUI, and IVF to realize their dreams of a healthy, happy baby. Most often, ART is used in cases of hormonal challenges such as high FSH, fallopian tube blockage, ovarian and ovulatory conditions, luteal phase defect, infertility due to endometriosis, abnormal uterine, cervical, and immunologic factors, sperm abnormalities, and the all-too-common-we-can’t-figure-you-out diagnosis: idiopathic infertility.

Improving surgical and hormonal/chemical protocols are helping, but overall viable pregnancy and live birth rates are still undeniably low for those women only utilizing Western medicine. Couples dealing with infertility are increasingly looking “outside-the-box” and exploring CAM therapies such as massage therapy, stress reduction techniques, biofeedback, aromatherapy, nutritional and herbal supplements, and especially acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM).

Traditional Chinese Medicine - including Acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine - has been found, for centuries, to regulate the female reproductive system, to regulate the menstrual cycle, to clear blockages from and nourish the ovaries and uterus, and to regulate hormones, effectively treating infertility. TCM achieves this largely through acupuncture’s ability to reduce stress (aka “Move Stuck Qi”) and herbal medicine’s ability to directly nourish the reproductive system and manipulate hormones. When added to current bio-medical ART protocols, TCM treatment can boost both viable pregnancy and “take-home-baby” success rates by nearly 50%.

Acupuncture - TCM’s biophysical therapy - manipulates the body’s “Yang Qi” in order to “unblock stagnations,” “move out accumulations,” enhance organ, metabolic, and neurotransmitter health, improve blood flow to organs like the uterus (thereby thickening uterine lining) and ovaries (thereby promoting ovulation), and finally by reducing “stress” by increasing vagal tone, and reducing sympathetic nervous dominance and attendant high cortisol levels. As well, acupuncture can favorably regulate chemical and hormonal levels in the body and reduce, for instance, a high FSH. Acupuncture as a stand alone therapy was investigated in a famous 2002 German clinical trial on IVF, with a viable pregnancy success jump from 26% without acupuncture to 43% with acupuncture!

Chinese herbal medicine - TCM’s biochemical therapy - provides micro-nutrients that directly benefit organ and tissue health, purge excesses/accumulations (i.e. endometrial tissue/fibroids/ cysts), clear blockages (i.e. of fallopian tube), and provide hormonal precursors to effectively manipulate progesterone, estrogen, and FSH. Chinese herbs, like acupuncture, can also mobilize and move our “Yang QI,” while acupuncture has definite limitations in “Enriching Yin” (i.e. estrogen) and “Nourishing Blood” (i.e. inducing ovulation), two important therapeutic strategies commonly used in TCM’s treatment of infertility. In China, herbal medicine is often the therapy of choice for infertility, while in the West acupuncture has received nearly all the press, due largely to inherent biases and skepticism within conventional reproductive endocrinology towards any non-pharmacologic chemical approach. Clinical trials worldwide continue to reveal Chinese herbal medicine’s effectiveness in the treatment of infertility.

Licensed Acupuncturists trained in TCM and herbal medicine will take a complete menstrual and medical history, palpate the radial arteries, visually inspect the tongue, and ideally require and evaluate BBT and ovulation monitoring in order to effectively diagnose. The information gathered from the interview, certain pulse qualities, tongue shapes and colors, and knowledge of ovulation timing and BBT shifts all lead to the differential diagnosis: the “Pattern(s) of Disharmony” as they are referred to. TCM diagnoses sound quite alien compared to Western medical diagnoses - “Liver Qi and Blood Stagnation,” Kidney and Spleen Qi Deficiency,” “Heart and Kidney Mis-communicating” are an odd-sounding but typical pattern constellation corresponding, for example, to a conventional Western diagnosis of idiopathic infertility.

Typical treatment in TCM includes the primary therapies of acupuncture, Chinese herbal medicine, and nutritional and lifestyle counseling, as well as secondary helpers like Qigong, moxibustion, cupping and guasha (Google ‘em!) to achieve the treatment principles of (continuing the example) clearing “Liver Qi and Blood Stagnation,” nourishing “Spleen and Kidney Qi,” and “Re-introducing the Heart to the Kidneys.” To flesh this theory out a bit more: smoothly circulating Liver “Qi” (functional energy) and Blood are necessary for smooth and appropriate cycle timing, pelvic blood flow, and follicular development and egg release; bountiful Spleen and Kidney Qi correspond to hormonal factors and uterine and ovarian health, and “Heart and Kidney Communication” refers to psycho-emotional or stress-related obstacles to pregnancy. This imaginary patient, responding well, may then within 3 to 6 menstrual cycles be having far fewer PMS symptoms, her cycle and menstrual lengths and timing normalized, menstrual pain diminished, more consistent ovulation with good BBT profile, better sleep/less stressed/better mood ... viable pregnancy and a healthy, happy baby!

The unfortunate search for a healthy pregnancy and baby is indeed a stressful and difficult balancing act. The Doc visits and all the diagnostics, the oral/injectable/topical hormonal treatments, the expense, the waiting ... Stress itself, widely defined, is certainly a known obstacle to conception and pregnancy, creating very real neurotransmitter and hormonal challenges, yet the sad irony is that often the conventional treatment approach itself is all too stressful! Traditional Chinese Medicine and Acupuncture seem for many women to be key to reducing this stress and have all “Qi,” Blood, and hormones abundant and flowing smoothly - the perfectly balanced environment for a natural or medically encouraged conception, pregnancy, and delivery of a happy, healthy bundle!

Boyd Bailey, L.Ac. and Keoni Teta, L.Ac. practice acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine at Piedmont Acupuncture & Oriental Medicine in Winston-Salem, NC, where they specialize in women’s health and infertility, pain management and neuromuscular conditions, gastrointestinal and digestive health, and psycho-emotional support and stress-management. Phone 336-777-0037 or visit www.piedmontacupuncture.com.