With the dozens of posts covering hundreds of scientific publications and my own experience with acupuncture trainingand practice, I have surely exhausted the subject. Right? Well, in my own mind I have since it is clear to me that acupuncture is founded on a combination of folk mythology and unreliable science, and it almost certainly does little to nothing useful for our pets.
That said, it is still accepted as beneficial by plenty of vets and pet owners, largely on the basis of unreliable anecdotal evidence and an enormous, though ultimately unconvincing, scientific literature. Therefore, I feel obliged to continue my occasional, and almost certainly futile, efforts to protect pets and their owners from wasting time and money, and failing to effectively treat serious medical problems, by employing acupuncture.
A recent study of acupuncture as a treatment for pain in dogs after ovariohysterectomy (spay surgery) reinforces the case against this practice-
Iwe C, Schiele A, Passenegg V, Corona D, Bettschart-Wolfensberger R and Heitzmann V (2025) Does perioperative electroacupuncture reduce postoperative pain in dogs undergoing ovariohysterectomy? Front. Vet. Sci. 11:1513853
The investigators compared pain scores in dogs after spay surgery between two groups of dogs: all getting the standard treatment (an opioid called butorphanol, a sedative called medetomidine, general anesthesia, and an NSAID called meloxicam), some randomly assigned to “electroacupuncture” (electrical stimulation through needs at purported acupuncture points, though these don’t really exist) and “fake” electroacupuncture (needles at the same locations not actually penetrating the skin). The pain assessment was don’t by vets who were, in theory, unable to tell which group got the real and which the fake acupuncture (the needles were passed through a piece of opaque foam so the skin underneath couldn’t be seen).
The result was no difference in pain scores between the groups at any point. Some dogs did show evidence of increased discomfort shortly after surgery, and this was likely due to the use of butorphanol, which is a weak and short-acting opioid and no longer considered adequate for use in a surgical procedure like this.
Of course, negative findings like this never convince believers in acupuncture, and the results didn’t disturb the investigators at all. They simply pointed out positive findings in other studies and came up with a list of excuses- the wrong length of time for treatment, treatment during general anesthesia, possible interference from drugs used, etc. Every possible explanation except for the most plausible- acupuncture is nonsense and doesn’t reduce pain except through placebo effects!
