How to Use Acupuncture Points to Quit Smoking

Are you struggling to quit smoking? No matter how hard you try, you keep rebounding. In that case, stick around because I’m going to show you the Acupuncture points to quit smoking so you can finally break free from tobacco.

Quitting smoking is no easy task, but that doesn’t mean there is no hope. Traditional Chinese Medicine is immensely helpful when dealing with smoking addiction.

It helps you deal with the stress caused by cravings and reduce them and can even make the cigarettes taste so bad you don’t even crave them.

Yes, you read that well.

In this article, you will learn how to use Acupuncture to quit smoking, the treatment goals, and the results of some research with encouraging results.

The Reality of Tobacco Addiction

Tobacco consumption causes an estimated 7 million deaths worldwide, it is a major health hazard and one of the most difficult conditions to treat. Unlike other kinds of addictions, tobacco is legal and widely available, making withdrawal more difficult.

While most smokers think they can quit whenever they want, the reality is that the vast majority of people who try to quit find out it’s harder than they thought and most of the time end up relapsing.

Hence the difficulty of this treatment.

Several strategies have been designed each with varying levels of efficacy: from nicotine patches to counseling. Some people find it useful to go cold turkey, while others experience massive anxiety when abstinence symptoms kick in.

Acupuncture remains a little-known intervention that can be used to help you stop smoking. Yet, there is evidence that suggests that people can benefit greatly from it.

So let’s see how you can use acupuncture points to quit smoking, and what some research says about it.

How to Use Acupuncture Points to Quit Smoking

You can use Acupuncture to quit smoking as a sole treatment method or in conjunction with other types of therapy like counseling or nicotine patches.

I’m guessing you are not that fond of nicotine patches and are opting for something more natural. In that case, I highly recommend you combine Acupuncture with some behavioral tools like learning a trade, origami, doing Tai Chi or Qi Gong.

These behavioral tools will relax your mind lower the stress that is caused by abstinence, and keep your mind busy.

Find a hobby or craft that completely absorbs you and makes you lose track of time. That’s the ideal one. You will find your state of flow or something close to the Wu-Wei.

You can get two, three, or even five Acupuncture sessions a week, depending on your availability and the arrangement with your TCM doctor.

If you opt to complement it with Acupressure at home, you can stimulate the points two or three times a day for minutes.

But how does sticking a needle in your body help you stay away from smoking? Let’s find out:

Main Mechanisms Acupuncture Helps Quitting Smoking

Acupuncture helps you cease to smoke because of four main mechanisms:

• Reduction of overall stress levels: Acupuncture has been shown to have a relaxing effect on people, reducing their stress levels, and thus fighting the anxiety caused by the withdrawal.
• Reduction of cravings: Closely related to the reduction of stress levels, Acupuncture also helps in reducing the frequency and intensity of the cravings you will initially feel when quitting smoking.
• Tonification of the Lungs: As the Lungs are the main organs harmed by smoking, a special emphasis is placed on strengthening them, making them healthier improving the quality of life of the patient, and thus making relapse harder.
• Worsening of the cigarette taste during treatment: A study showed that during acupuncture treatment to quit smoking, the patients stated to have perceived a worsening of the taste of the cigarette they were smoking.

Acupuncture has shown similar results to nicotine replacement in aiding tobacco cessation. This study states that the combination of Acupuncture with counseling and tobacco cessation education is effective and superior to Acupuncture by itself, which shows the need for a multi-faceted approach to quitting smoking.

Acupuncture Points to Quit Smoking: Point Selection

When selecting acupuncture points to quit smoking, the combination of the points in both the body and ear is better than using just body acupuncture points. It gives you a more rounded approach and it has a vital advantage.

The Ear acupuncture points related to the Lungs, and Shenmen deal with cravings helping you relax making the abstinence more endurable.

As said before, the selection of the points is based on the goals of reducing stress, strengthening the Lungs, and reducing cravings.

Here are the Acupuncture points used to quit smoking.

Body Acupuncture

• Lung 7: It is located on the lateral edge of the radius bone 1.5 cun superior to the wrist crease. It is a point used to strengthen the Lungs.
• Large Intestine 4: Located on the back of your hand, in the area between your thumb and index finger, in the middle of the metacarpal bone of your index finger on its radial side.
• Stomach 36: Located in your leg, three cun below the kneecap and one cun lateral to the tip of the tibia. You can find it by placing your hand over your knee so that your wrist lays on the upper edge of the kneecap, placing your ring finger on the tip of the tibia, and relaxing your fingers, Stomach 36 is located where your ring finger lies.
• Governor Vessel 20: Situated at the top of the head, in the intersection of lines drawn from the tip of the ears and the midline, this point promotes relaxation and uplifts the spirit.

Ear Acupuncture

• Shenmen: Located at the tip of the Triangular fossa of the ear. It is a major analgesic, and relaxation point that helps with cravings and agitation.
• Point Zero: located at the center of the ear cartilage ridge, almost exactly in the middle of the ear.

The Points can be stimulated using regular Acupuncture with needles, the ear acupuncture points can be stimulated by the placing of seeds for continuous treatment. Laser acupuncture can also be used.

The Advantage of the Combination of Ear and Body Acupuncture Points

The combination of Ear and body acupuncture points for smoking is that you can stimulate the points in your ears at home.

While you need to go to your TCM doctor for your acupuncture session, the seeds planted in your ear points allow you to stimulate those points every day.

Just rub them against your ear or squeeze them like you are popping up a pill from the blister.

Scientific Evidence of Acupuncture Points to Quit Smoking

Now let’s see what the research says. There has been a good amount of studies investigating whether acupuncture is useful or not when it comes to quitting smoking. As it always happens, many studies have not a statistically significant sample size and further studies with better quality should be conducted.

However, there is evidence, for as little as it may seem it still sheds insights into the efficacy of Acupuncture as a valid intervention.

Let’s go over a couple of studies and see the amazing results:

The first study titled “Painless Laser Acupuncture for Smoking Cessation” examined the effectiveness of laser acupuncture for helping smokers quit. It took 175 participants, mostly middle-aged executives who smoked one pack per day or even more. The treatment targeted both auricular and body acupuncture points over seven sessions.

The results showed a high success rate, with 84.77% of men and 87.50% of women quitting smoking after the treatment. The painless nature of the technique improved patient compliance, and the therapy helped restore homeostasis and reduce cravings without causing withdrawal effects.

Even those who had a relapse sustained a substantial reduction in their cigarette consumption with only one to two cigarettes a day. Some smoked despite having no cravings.

Read the article Here.

Another paper published in 2014 in the journal Medical Acupuncture titled “Auriculotherapy for Smoking Cessation: An Observational Study of Outcomes” evaluated the effectiveness of ear acupuncture for smoking cessation among 185 patients. The results showed that auriculotherapy combined with standard medication was more effective than either treatment alone. While auriculotherapy alone performed similarly to drug therapy in promoting cessation, combined treatments led to better outcomes, especially in heavier smokers. The study highlights auriculotherapy’s potential in managing nicotine withdrawal with minimal side effects, suggesting it is a valuable complement to conventional treatments.

Link to the article Here.

Final thoughts

Acupuncture is a valid and effective method to help you quit smoking and is one with a high percentage of effectiveness and zero side effects. You will greatly benefit from getting regular acupuncture sessions tailored to help you quit smoking.

If you want the best results then combine Acupuncture with counseling therapy.

Hope you can break free from smoking, I’m rooting for you.