“How long does it take for acupuncture to work for stress?”

About three times.

Acupuncture with herbs, and sometimes massage, can treat and help relieve anxiety and stress. The number of sessions depends on the severity. I suggest you try it.

Instant

Usually people feel relief in the first session. For stress management people will come once a week until they are feeling like they can manage their stress on their own.

Need further evaluation.

It helps with stress almost immediately. To make it sustainable you may need to come for awhile like 14 treatments.

Usually, the patient can feel changes from the first session, but for a complete treatment, 6 to 8 sessions are needed.

It can help in a matter of minutes. My patients get up off the table feeling very relaxed almost every time. But you'll need to go through a series of treatments for it to last for more than a short time after a treatment.

Acupuncture naturally increases serotonin and dopamine levels, as well as endorphins in the body, so it works after the first appointment. The effect should last a day or two after the first appointment and a little longer after each subsequent appointment, provided you go on a frequent basis.

One treatment 3-5 times, depending on your condition.

A patient can feel some release in a couple of minutes.

Good afternoon,

Regarding your question, it depends on how long the patient has the stress, and the cause of stress. Usually takes 2-3 treatments to start working.

David

Great question! For about 91% of my patients through the years, they feel immediate results of relaxation and stress melting away. For others, it may take longer, especially if the condition of anxiety has been chronic for many years. It's best to set expectations that your results may not be apparent for a number of sessions, depending on your situation and the
practitioner's abilities. Traditional Chinese Herbal Medicine also can hasten the desired results, smoothing and complementing the process of acupuncture.

Impossible question to accurately answer. Everyone is an individual with a unique set of imbalances... and that is why our medicine is so effective--it is always tailored to the individual's needs in the moment.

if the anxiety is rooted (caused by) a kidney deficiency, it could take months to find relief and require lifestyle changes.

It takes around 5 treatments to work for anxiety usually, but sometimes longer, sometimes short.

Everyone responds differently. Some will see effects within minutes. Some will take several treatments.

Acupuncture will work immediately for stress. you should feel immediate relieve and relaxation by the end of your first appointment. How long that feeling lasts is different for everyone. If your stress is between a 7 and a 10 I would say acupuncture 2x a week is necessary and you should definitely consider going on some Chinese herbs to support you while at home. Your acupuncturist will know which herbs are best for your condition. But I would start with adding adaptogens to your diet. Adding breathing exercises to your daily activity, and short bursts of high intensity exercises throughout the day will also be helpful.

You may feel relief right away. Acupuncture has been proven to take your body from a sympathetic nervous state to a parasympathetic nervous state. If you don't feel immediate relief, I suggest giving it 5-8 treatments. If you're still not finding any changes in your body or your symptoms, try another acupuncturist or a different style of acupuncture.

it does help stress: acute or chronic.

How long does it take for acupuncture to work for "x" condition is a question I get a lot. The problem is, it's impossible to answer. This is the case for 3 main reasons:

1. There are a lot of providers in the US who are offering "acupuncture-like" services under the scope of some other licensure (like chiropractors, physical therapists and, increasingly, even athletic trainers). The problem is, unless they happen to be dual credentialed and licensed, none of them have actually attended or graduated from a school of Chinese medicine - most of the time they have 100 hours or less of training (compared to 2,000 to 4,000 hours of the typical graduate of a US based Chinese medicine program). They usually offer what we refer to as "cookbook acupuncture" which rarely works - in the unusual case where "cookbook acupuncture" does work, it can take quite a few treatments to get the job done. Since I don't know what provider you're seeing or what education and credentialing they have, it's hard to set your expectations.

2. The diagnostic model in Chinese medicine is individualized. Even though people might experience the same symptoms, they often don't experience those symptoms for the same reason. Chinese medicine recognizes this and the diagnostic model accounts for these individual differences. Just like conventional medicine, in Chinese medicine some diagnoses are easier to treat than others. Without actually seeing a patient and diagnosing them, it's hard to provide anything other than the most general guidance in terms of how many treatments it might take to get to symptom decrease or symptom resolution.

3. Acupuncture and Chinese medicine are not a monolithic system. In other words there isn't one single acupuncture approach. There are a variety of acupuncture systems in use around the world and different practitioners sometimes specialize in different systems. Some of these systems are a better fit for certain kinds of issues than others. So, without knowing what system(s) of acupuncture you have available to you, it's hard to set your expectations in terms of how long it might take to relieve your symptoms.

All that being said, assuming you're seeing an actual NCCAOM board certified and state licensed acupuncturist (L.Ac. or R.Ac.), it might take something on the order of 5-7 treatments to get your stress under control. Since stress is one of those issues that often has a significant lifestyle component, a patients ability to make changes outside of the treatment schedule can have a large impact on the total number of treatments necessary. Also, with stress in particular, it's entirely probable that you'll notice a difference in a treatment or two.