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What is the Difference Between Dry Needling and Acupuncture?

 

Have you ever heard of dry needling or acupuncture? Both are treatments that use very thin needles to help with pain (and other issues), but they work in different ways! I am a Doctor of Physical Therapy that is certified in dry needling. So I use it quite often to help people get out of pain and improve their mobility. I get asked often what the difference in dry needling and acupuncture is. So let’s talk about it here!

 

What is Dry Needling?


Dry needling is a type of treatment that uses thin, monofilament needles to target trigger points (or tight knots) in muscles. It’s called “dry” because nothing is injected from the needle. It is used to target these knots and help them relax and reset. This helps by providing blood flow to the area for healing, improved length to the muscles, and improving pain after.

Dry needling follows western medicine and is very well researched. It is safe and effective.

 

What is Acupuncture?


Acupuncture has been around for thousands of years and comes from traditional Chinese medicine. It also uses thin needles, but instead of just focusing on muscles, acupuncture tries to balance the energy in your body. This energy is called "Qi" (pronounced “chee”). Acupuncturists place needles in specific spots on your body to help with pain, stress, and many other health problems.

 

What Are the Differences?


While both dry needling and acupuncture use needles, there are some big differences:

 

- How They Work: Dry needling focuses on addressing local muscle dysfunction. The goal is to get rid of knots and tightness in the muscles. I find that most of the pain people experience comes from muscle dysfunction. So when we can use a tool like dry needling in combination with movement/strengthening, then we get great results.


Acupuncture, on the other hand, is all about balancing the body’s energy (Qi) to help with many health problems. The goal is not necessarily to target a specific muscular tissue or palpate for trigger points in this practice. You may have needles in different areas of your body than what you are being treated for.

 

- Where Needles Go: In dry needling, the needles go directly into sore or tight muscles. In acupuncture, the needles go into special points on the body that are believed to control energy flow.

 

- Purpose: Dry needling is mostly used to help with muscle pain, tightness and lack of mobility. Acupuncture can help with lots of things, like pain, stress, headaches, digestion issues, sleep problems, etc.

 


Dr. Sieara Hinshaw, a performance physical therapist in Asheville, NC, is dry needling a patient in their rotator cuff muscle to help improve their pain and mobility.


Which One is Right for Me?


Both dry needling and acupuncture can be effective, but which one is best for you depends on what you need help with! I believe that they can be used together in a collaborative approach or separately to help you find improvements in how your body feels.

I recommend you seek guidance from a medical professional to determine what might be best for you.

 

Within an initial evaluation, I can determine whether you would be a good candidate for dry needling. It is just one manual treatment method, but it does provide a window of improved pain/mobility that is typically longer than other techniques such as massage, joint mobilizations, cupping, etc. If you have more questions about dry needling and how it might help you, feel free to set up a free call with me below so we can discuss what’s going on and your goals!

 

I hope this was helpful!

 

Sincerely,

Dr. Sieara Hinshaw

828-808-3704



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