What Is Veterinary Acupuncture?
Veterinary acupuncture is the use of very fine, sterile needles, inserted carefully into certain, bespoke points across the body. It should always be carried out by an experienced professional, and the goal is to improve or treat the issues, discomfort, or pain resulting from a medical condition. Just like many humans receive acupuncture treatment, veterinary acupuncture treatment can have the same effect on our beloved animals and make them more comfortable, calmer, and healthier through our careful holistic care. Acupuncture has been used for well over 2000 years for different diseases and patterns.
Which Issues Can Veterinary Acupuncture Help with?
The list of things that can be helped by veterinary acupuncture is very long. The possibility for a targeted approach to specific body parts and types of pain mean that veterinary acupuncture can make a significant difference to injuries, nerve pains and psychosomatic troubles as well as digestive, skin and hormonal problems plus many more. It’s also been seen to have significant effects on the comfort of oncology patients and palliative care patients – both human and animal.
Which Animals Can Veterinary Acupuncture Be Used for?
Here at Chirovet Wales, we work offering veterinary acupuncture primarily to horses, dogs, cats. We love our equine, canine and feline patients, but we also love working with farm and other animals too, so if you’ve got any questions or curiosities about our services with respect to a different creature, we’d love to hear from you so we can share more information about how our veterinary acupuncture services can help. Visit our acupuncture services here:
Does Veterinary Acupuncture Work?
Veterinary acupuncture is a form of CAM – complementary and alternative medicine – which means that it isn’t a replacement for some medical treatment Although we have plenty of cases where we have successfully treated patients where conventional medicine has failed. We understand some people may be sceptical, so let us reassure you: our focus on a holistic approach takes into account your animal’s lifestyle and wellbeing as well as their health, so we can offer impactful care and treatment, focused on making your animal happier and more comfortable as well as treating the root of the problem – we think that’s most important. Check out our testimonials for some very happy clients and their even happier animals for some extra reassurance!
In terms of what’s happening inside the body, veterinary acupuncture stimulates specific points identified by our skilled and experienced vet, which then trigger a cellular and hormonal response from the body as a result. Consequently, using veterinary acupuncture needles at carefully selected points across the body will trigger responses on a local and somatic spectrum, enabling us to use veterinary acupuncture to create a targeted treatment that eases various issues at their core.
Is Veterinary Acupuncture Painful?
The short answer: no! Veterinary acupuncture, just like acupuncture for humans, uses very fine, sharp needles, which gently pierce the skin in between tissues. For some it feels like a dull ache, others feel it like a zingy energy, and some feel nothing at all. It can feel bizarre sometimes, but it won’t hurt!
Don’t worry – we pay very close attention to your animal during the veterinary acupuncture process and we monitor for signs of discomfort. In the unusual event that we see your animal is unhappy, we replace the acupuncture needle with laser acupuncture with the same effect. For the laser acupuncture the animal doesn’t need to be touched, so if they feel anxious they can just sit on your lap.
How Safe Is Veterinary Acupuncture?
We understand it can be a little alarming to think of someone putting needles in your beloved animal! But don’t worry: our years of training and research, professional experience and proven track record of success should help reassure you that we aren’t going to harm your pet. Because veterinary acupuncture uses very fine needles to carefully stimulate nerves, it isn’t going to do any damage, and our vets extensive knowledge of animal anatomy means they know the perfect points to choose – it’s totally safe.
What Is the Cost of Veterinary Acupuncture?
This depends if you’re interested in a one-off session, or our more recommended and impactful course of treatment, as well as what kind of animal we’ll be working with. We’d love to hear from you to talk about how we can help and give you some more information.
Is Veterinary Acupuncture Used Alongside Other Veterinary Practices?
Absolutely! It’s important to carry a respect and understanding of traditional western medical practice, I was a conventional vet for some years before specialising into holistic practice. Therefore we request the medical history of your animal prior to the first visit, so we know the exact history of treatment and can include that knowledge into the picture. We like to work together with your conventional veterinarian, at the end of the day we all want the best for your animal.
Health is so much more than simply fixing an illness or an injury, and what we do is look at the animal as a whole, their life and their surroundings, training, lifestyle, and take all of this into account in our treatment, and veterinary acupuncture is a part of that.