By Jenny Leal
Contributing writer
After thirty years of working as a surgeon, primarily with cancer patients, Ed Gotfried had grown tired of seeing traditional remedies of chemotherapy and radiation fail and watching patients suffer through great pain in the process. When a colleague went for training in acupuncture treatment at the University of California at Los Angeles, it rekindled his interest in the area.
He later attended UCLA's program and now runs a clinic in Parks Hall offering acupuncture treatment. Acupuncture, an ancient healing system, involves inserting needles into parts of the body that will help suppress the pain stimulus and encourage the body to use its natural pain relievers called endorphins.
Gotfried, associate professor of surgery, said he quickly had his notion of using acupuncture only as a "miracle" cure for terminal patients corrected. "When I got to Los Angeles, they told me I was looking at it all wrong, that there are a lot of preventive medical components of acupuncture."
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) condones the use of acupuncture for treating adult postoperative and chemotherapy nausea, as well as addiction, stroke rehabilitation, headache, menstrual cramps, asthma and many other conditions.
When Gotfried's clinic started he had a lot of patients. For many of them, traditional Western medicine had been unsuccessful, but insurance didn't cover alternative remedies.
One of those patients was a middle-aged man with chronic pain from a bladder infection. His pain was so intense he would lie curled up like a ball. He could only function with opioids, a pain medication. Through his own research, the man found that acupuncture had been used successfully for this problem. The man received several treatments from Gotfried. But one was all it took for him to become a believer.
"After the first time, he came with his wife as a witness," Gotfried said. "He had gone days without taking any opioids. His wife said, 'something different has happened to my husband.'" She wrote the insurance provider for Ohio University and convinced them to cover acupuncture as a preapproved treatment.
Gotfried also has had a lot of positive interest from Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine students. He conducted an informal study by offering treatment for stress relief and mental clarity to students the day before their National Board Exam. Forty people showed up. He said 92 percent of all the students passed the exam and 100 percent of those in the track he worked with passed.
"Now we are beginning to get proof that it works. That's the fun part for me. The whole world is beginning to realize it works," he added.
OU-COM has established a relationship with eight Chinese medical schools for the exchange of faculty and students. In Chinese hospitals, Gotfried said, Western medicine and surgery are practiced but often in the postoperative period, acupuncture and herbal remedies are used in addition. In fact, he said, herbal medicine is much more common than acupuncture.
Gotfried is now running two sessions of his acupuncture clinic, but he hopes to add another one soon. He is investigating funding from the NIH to determine if there are any benefits for Alzheimer's and dementia, since acupuncture seems to improve mental clarity.
"We're just beginning to scratch the surface," he said. "Each day is such a wonderful adventure."
