Blood fluidity and "Oketsu; blood stagnation", effect of acupuncture and its mechanisms / 全日本鍼灸学会雑誌

ABSTRACT

In oriental medicine, the state in which blood is stagnant is called "oketsu, (Yu xie)"meaning preceding state or symptomatic of sickness. However, the pathological detail and mechanism of "oketsu"is not clear. Therefore we attempt to clarify the meaning of "oketsu"with Western medical knowledge and methods. The relationship between "oketsu"and blood fluidity (BF) was studied in human studies and the influence of several kinds of stress, "anti-oketsu"herbal medicine, electro-acupuncture stimulation (ACU), adrenoceptor agonist and antagonist on BF, platelet aggregation (PA), plasma ATP level, reactive oxygen metabolites level (d-ROM) and biological anti-oxidant potential level (BAP) were studied in animal studies using male Wistar rats. BF and PA were examined using a Micro Channel Array Flow Analyzer (MC-FAN) and a laser scattering platelet aggregometer (PA-20), respectively. D-ROM and BAP levels were studied using a Free Radical Elective Evaluator. In ACU study, 1Hz, 3-5 V stimulation was applied to the acupoints for 15 or 60 minutes. Stimulated acupoints were as follows:ZuSanli (ST-36), Sanyinjiao (SP-6), Hegu (L-I4), Neiguan (P-6) and Shenshu (BL-23). A significant decrease of BF was observed in "oketsu"patients compared to the "non-oketsu"patients in human studies. In the animal study, restrained and electrical shock stress applied to rats results in a quick decrease of BF, increase of PA, increase of plasma ATP level, increase of d-ROM level and decrease of BAP level. ACU applied to ST-36, SP-6 and L-14 revealed significant increases in BF, while PA activity decreased. The effect was observed even with 15 min stimulation. However, no significant changes were observed when ACU was applied to P-6 and BL-23. Furthermore, ACU applied to ST-36 represented a significant reduction to the stress induced blood changes such as BF, PA, plasma ATP level, d-ROM, and BAP level. These data suggest the close relation of BF with the "Oketsu"and that sympathetic nervous system activity and plasma ATP level have important roles in the changes of blood fluidity. Acupoints may have some role in the result that ACU affects BF depending on the stimulation loci. ACU has an immediate effect on BF since 15 min stimulation shows a significant effect. PA decrease by ACU suggests that an increase of BF is mainly associated with PA ability. The result that ACU reduced the stress induced BF and other changes of blood properties may imply that ACU has anti-stress activity.