My focus in this discussion is acupuncture treatment for chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), especially in youth. CFS is an increasing health problem today in the youth population.
There is one particular patient that comes to mind – if you like, a clinical case history of a young fellow who is very active. He is a really good-hearted young man.
When he first came to our clinic, Acupuncture Brisbane, I think he was 17 or 18 years old – now he is 19 or 20 years. He came in with the assistance of his family. He was not able to make his own way in as he was too weak and debilitated to do that.
He had spent round about nine months pretty well in bed. We are talking here about a strapping, young lad who was six feet plus, or two metres plus. He was a hulking boy of 90-95 kilos. As I said, he was a really nice lad, athletic and a very good cricketer who loved his sport.
This lad had been in terrible shape for six to nine months. The first question that both he and his family asked me was, “Can you help?” My answer in those sorts of situations is, “I’ll do my absolute best”. There is no way to provide a guarantee in any situation that involves human beings and health. Any medical practitioner would confirm this, especially in situations involving complex health problems such as chronic fatigue syndrome.
However, one thing I can say is that Japanese acupuncture, in the hands of a skilled practitioner, can be an incredibly powerful healing tool. This is particularly where the individual has hit a dead-end in relation to other forms of medical treatment.
If you or our son or daughter are in the youth group and have been in bed and unable to carry out any sort of creative or productive activity, or even move, for six to nine months, you will have tried every last method and made every last effort to regain your health. If you are the brother, sister or partner you would also exhaust all possibilities to help the person recover. These are the kinds of situations that I am confronted with in my acupuncture practice.
Acupuncture is commonly the last resort that people choose for illnesses like chronic fatigue syndrome in youth. So please understand that there is no hopeless condition in this scenario.
I have provided healing through acupuncture for a person who had previously suffered CFS for 18 years. That person is not in the youth group that I am focusing on here, however, it demonstrates that people can be helped even if they have suffered from this condition for a very long time.
It is so heartening to treat the young man I have referred to. He is coming in this afternoon for a top-up acupuncture treatment. He is actively playing “A” grade cricket again. He hasn’t scored any runs since his return and is disappointed about that. I’m hoping he will come in this afternoon and say he got a bag of runs on the weekend.
He’s now back at work. He is able to train and play cricket. His life has come back. It took some time – it took us probably six months for him to start to get strong enough to go back into training and eventually to increase his cricket training. Then he started to play cricket a bit more – he played last season. Now he is back this season and is back fully at work.
As an acupuncture practitioner and as an individual, it gives me an enormous amount of satisfaction to see someone recover from the deleterious effects of chronic fatigue syndrome, especially someone in their youth with their life ahead of them. It is particularly rewarding to know that after he tried all other forms of treatment without success, he was able to come to our acupuncture clinic and we were able to help him so effectively.
So I would encourage parents who have a youth suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome to seek treatment at our Acupuncture Brisbane or Acupuncture Gold Coast clinic
