Science behind Acupuncture

The Foundation:

Why Medicine is More Than Pure Science

When discussing scientific history, China has long been a global leader. Consider the Four Great Inventions: the Compass, Gunpowder, Paper-making, and Printing. These are celebrated as symbols of ancient China's advanced science and technology.

Yet, there is another invention perhaps most deeply connected to human survival: Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). One could argue that TCM is the "Fifth Great Invention," as it has effectively promoted human health not only in ancient times but continues to do so worldwide today.

What is medicine?

One thing is certain: medicine is not pure science. Instead, it comprises sociology, anthropology, psychology, and more. As Dr. Fan Daiming, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, states: "Medicine predates science. The concept of modern science emerged only about 1,000 years ago, whereas medicine has a history of thousands of years. We cannot use rigid scientific laws to fully explain medicine, nor can we simply use scientific standards to constrain the physician."

Science deals with the laws of natural phenomena with a high degree of universality. Medicine, however, emphasizes the profound heterogeneity and uniqueness of human structure, function, and disease. There are over 40,000 distinct diseases, each with different stages and presentations in different individuals. This constitutes the immense complexity of medicine.

Because of this complexity, we cannot stereotype medicine. Patients must be treated differently—varying from time to time, and varying from place to place.

The Parachute and the Skydiver

In medicine, science is like the canopy of a parachute, and the physician is the skydiver. The canopy provides the lift, but to land safely, you must hold onto the cords—clinical experience, human psychology, and the individual patient's environment. If a physician relies only on the rigid data of science without the experience of treating the whole human being, the parachute will fail to open.

This is why Dr. Na's system succeeds where standard protocols fail. It uses the best of modern science, but relies on forty years of clinical experience to treat the complex, unique, and dynamic human being sitting in front of her.

Why I Practice TCM

Almost forty years ago, I stood proud in my small hometown, clutching my medical degree. After five years of grueling study, I had become an internist at a big hospital in town—a dream I had nurtured since childhood.

But reality arrived quickly. And with it came a crushing weight I had not anticipated.

The promise of healing that modern medicine seemed to offer felt increasingly hollow with each passing day.

My Friend. My Failure. What It Taught Me.

A childhood friend came to me complaining of a headache that had plagued her for months. I ran every test I could think of—blood work, imaging, neurological exams. All results came back normal. I tried various medications, hoping to release her from the pain. They offered only temporary relief at best.

Eventually, I had to look her in the eye and say the words no doctor ever wants to utter: "I'm sorry."

This was not an isolated incident. It happened almost daily during my three years of practice at the hospital. I felt deeply hurt, confused, and utterly lost.

Meanwhile, some of my classmates working in the emergency department were filled with pride and heroic spirit. They were saving lives daily—strokes, heart attacks, car accidents. Suddenly, it dawned on me: modern medicine excels in the ER, but it falls short when it comes to chronic conditions.

Why? Because acute and chronic illnesses have fundamentally different pathological backgrounds. The mistake, I realized, lay in applying the same protocols, the same medications, to two entirely different kinds of conditions.

Then one day, my headache-stricken friend returned—radiant and joyful. The painful, bleak expression she once wore had vanished.

"Hi Doc," she said with a smile. "I'm pain-free now. No more drugs."

Surprised? Ashamed? Seeing a new direction? I could not quite name what I felt.

"What happened? Who helped you?" I asked eagerly.

"My mother took me to a Chinese doctor," she explained. "He diagnosed me with a digestive disorder. He was right—I often had stomach pain, no appetite, and diarrhea. But the headache was what bothered me most."

I wanted to ask why she had not told me about her stomach issues. But I stopped myself. After all, I was the doctor. I should have assessed her whole body, not just focused on her headache.

Shame washed over me.

Why I Had Rejected TCM

The truth was, I had received training in TCM in medical school. Learning TCM was my mother's idea, not mine. TCM has been practiced for thousands of years and remains prevalent even today. Like most Chinese people, my mother deeply believed in it. TCM was simply part of her life.

I did not want to upset or disappoint her, so I entered the TCM program. But I poured all my effort into studying modern medicine instead.

My own life-saving experience that had shaped my beliefs.

My parents were workaholics. My father was a chief engineer in the railway industry. My mother was a schoolteacher. When I was a little girl, they sent my two brothers and me to a boarding school. We could only come home once a week.

At the age of ten, I fell seriously ill at school—later diagnosed as typhoid. High fever, nausea, crushing fatigue, headaches, and abdominal pain tormented me to the point of utter exhaustion. The school nurse thought it was just the flu and did not take it seriously. I lay bedridden in the dormitory day after day, with no sign of improvement.

Back home during the weekend, the doctors in the emergency room identified the real problem. Soon I was saved by those little pills. The immense relief after a week of devastating suffering was unforgettable.

It planted a seed in my heart—the noblest calling of being a doctor who saves lives. Not a TCM doctor. A real one.

The Brother I Watched Suffer

When I entered the big hospital my pride and confidence were beyond words. By then, I wanted nothing to do with TCM. It seemed old and outdated.

I also witnessed how TCM was practiced with my own eyes. I once watched a TCM doctor give my elderly brother acupuncture treatment for his asthma—every single day for months. His asthma eventually disappeared completely. But the torture was not just from the needles. It was from the ordeal of enduring the treatment day after day.

What I hated most were the herbs. My brother had to drink a big bowl of black herbal liquid twice a day, morning and night. The smell and taste were horrible. Each week at the herbal pharmacy, he received seven bags of raw herbs for the following seven days. His TCM doctor would adjust the composition according to the change of his symptoms.

My mother had to cook it for two to three hours every day—the terrible smell filling the entire room. Everyone around me seemed okay with TCM. I was not.

The Evidence I Could Not Ignore

For a while, I tried to ignore what had happened with my headache friend. I tried to convince myself that her recovery was just an incidental event. I could not accept the idea that TCM might be better than modern medicine. It could not be true.

But I could not shake it off.

Slowly, I began referring refractory patients to TCM practitioners. To my surprise, they all got better. One by one, they returned with their symptoms relieved or completely resolved.

The evidence became impossible to dismiss.

Finally, I decided to visit the TCM doctors who had healed my friend and many other patients for whom modern medicine had no solution. I had to. The contrast was too stark to ignore any longer.

It was like emerging from a dark night with no hope and no direction into a bright day full of joy and vitality. Simply put, it was too obvious to overlook.

Through these TCM doctors, I truly experienced what it meant to be a healer. I knew then that I wanted to become a TCM doctor, seriously and wholeheartedly.

But still, the acupuncture needles placed on various parts of the body looked and felt almost absurd.

Questions filled in my mind:

What were these needles doing to the body?

Did they really work? How?

And the herbs—ten, twenty, or even more grouped together. Was there some kind of synergy at play? How could anyone figure it out?

To find answers, I quit my job and stepped into the scientific world while pursuing my Master's and PhD degrees.

My first mission: find out whether acupuncture is genuinely effective or merely some kind of psychological effect.

That is where this part of the journey ends. The next chapter—the research, the discoveries, the clinical practice, the Springfield Clinic collaboration—is told in the pages that follow.

But it all began here. With a friend. A headache. And a physician who was willing to admit she was wrong.

On the streets of Japan

After the International Medical Congress in Japan

At the doctoral degree celebration with my supervisor Professor Shi Xuemin

With Professor Xu Ping

The State Journal-Register featured Dr. Na Zhai and Dr. Claude Fortin's collaboration.Our patient John Landers The newspaper headline read: "Acupuncture goes mainstream." China Health reports on the research findings of Dr. Zhai Na.