Needles help ease pain of depression: study

Acupuncture appears to help lift the mood of severely depressed people, a study of Australians suggests.

New research in Sydney has found a marked improvement in a group of people with medicated depression who were treated with traditional Chinese needle therapy for two months.

The study showed those with severe depression, particularly men, benefited most from the alternative therapy, still a controversial treatment option the medical world says only has "limited use''.

"What we've managed to show is that acupuncture can be a powerful aid to use alongside anti-depressants to help these people,'' said Kirk Wilson, a researcher at the College of Traditional Chinese Medicine at the University of Technology Sydney.

"That's very exciting for a condition that is potentially very debilitating.''

The researchers enlisted a group of about 40 people with severe depression, and allocated half to get 12 acupuncture treatments over eight weeks.

All were taking a standard SSRI antidepressant like Aropax, Prozac or Zoloft.

Interim results reported today show the average depression score among the group dropped from 30 pre-treatment, a severe rating, to 15 post-treatment, a mild rating.

Those in the non-treatment group remained static on 30.

"That's a pretty remarkable improvement,'' Mr Wilson said.

He said the mechanism was unclear, but it appeared the therapy was regulating energy channels within the body.

"We're using acupuncture to regulate the energy flow, release pressure and allow everything to move more freely,'' he said.

Western medical practitioners remain sceptical, saying the study was limited in its format and there was no proof the treatment continued to work over time.

Professor Michael Baigent, clinical adviser to beyondblue, said research into new ways to tackle the problem was important as drug therapies were not effective for all patients.

"But there's really still not enough convincing evidence for us to be advocating this as a main form of treatment,'' Prof Baigent said.

Anti-depressants, psychological therapies, exercise and treatment of related medical conditions like anaemia remain the best treatments, he said.

There was also reasonable, although mixed, evidence to support the use of St John's Wort, which acts like a weak SSRI, and omega-3 fatty acids.

Meditation and removing alcohol from the diet has also shown benefits, while light therapy has been useful for people with seasonal affective disorder.

Other therapies like vitamins, homeopathy, ginkgo biloba, natural progesterone, glutamine, air ionisation and sugar avoidance were extremely limited, he said.

"I don't think anyone can seriously recommend these to help treat someone suffering from depression,'' the specialist said.