Pulse diagnosis is a characteristic method in traditional Chinese medicine. Meridian theory is also a unique therapy in traditional Chinese medicine. Furthermore, pulse diagnosis is one of the important methods for traditional Chinese medicine practitioner to monitor acupuncture effect.
A series of previous studies showed that the resonant conditions of the acupuncture point can be modulated by needling it. In this study, we investigated the acupuncture effect at San-yin-jiao (SP-6), on the spleen meridian, by calculating the Fourier components of the pulse wave based on the resonance theory.
In this study, 38 healthy subjects were randomly divided into 2 groups: San-yin-jiao group and non-acupuncture group. The right radial artery pressure pulse was recorded. Pulse spectrum was analyzed with Fourier transform. Acupuncture effect on the San-yin-jiao group was compared with the non-acupuncture group. Pair t-test for group comparison was performed.
The study results showed that, on the San-yin-jiao group, the harmonic proportion energy of the 3rd, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th harmonics were increased significantly by needle-in 15 minutes. As to the results on the non-acupuncture point group, the harmonic proportion energy of all except the 2nd harmonic were not increased significantly by needle-in 15 minutes. However, this specific frequency effect was not found either on the San-yin-jiao group or on the non-acupuncture group by needle-out 15 minutes.
According to these imperical results, we concluded that acupuncture can modulate the blood pressure spectrum and may then change blood distribution in the body. The blood distributes variably at different meridians depending on its frequencies.
