Analysis of Meridians Potential as Ground Condition for Objectification of Acupuncture Effect

침술 효과의 객관화를 위한 접지조건에 따른 경락전위분석

Background: As patients are positioned at insulated bed and practitioner are positioned at insulated floor or shoes, it could be a cause of lessening effect in acupuncture practice. We investigated how Ground connection could influence on the electrical meridian potential between practitioner and patient during acupuncture practice. Method: We treated 30 normal healthy subjects with acupuncture and measured changes in the electrical potential between the stomach meridian points ST-39 and ST-37 in response to light touch after insertion of a needle at ST-36. At first, we stimulated needle and measured electrical potentials for non ground, patient ground only, practitioner ground only, all ground, respectively. Result: All ground subject elicited positive mean potential $44.6{\pm}19.2{\mu}V$ and showed $181.4{\pm}59.7{\mu}V$ peak to peak potential. practitioner ground only showed negative mean potential $-51.5{\pm}9.3{\mu}V\;and\;367.4{\pm}27.8{\mu}V$ of peak to peak potential. Patient ground only revealed no mean potential as $2.9{\pm}1.3{\mu}V,\;16.4{\pm}11.9{\mu}V$ of peak to peak potential. All ground showed no mean potential as $1.6{\pm}0.7{\mu}V,\;3.3{\pm}1.9{\mu}V$ of peak to peak potential. respectively.