Am J Chin Med. 1991 ; 19(1): 9-15.

Treatment of iatrogenic Cushing's syndrome in dogs with electroacupuncture stimulation of stomach 36.

Lin JH, Su HL, Chang SH, Shien YS, Wu LS.

Department of Animal Husbandry, National Taiwan University, Taipei.

This study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of electroacupuncture (EA) on the recovery of adrenocortical function from Iatrogenic Cushings Syndrome (ICS) in dogs. Experiment I: Selection of the most effective Acupuncture point to treat ICS--Six healthy adult female dogs were treated bilaterally with EA for 15 minutes at loci BL22 + BL23 + BL24, ST36, or a non-locus control point on M. brachialis. Each dog was tested at all three sites in rotation. Blood samples were collected before and 0, 15 and 60 minutes after EA, and the serum cortisol levels were measured by radioimmunoassay. The data showed that EA at ST36 resulted in the highest response of serum cortisol levels among the three treatments. Experiment II: Evaluation of the effectiveness of EA ST36 in the treatment of ICS in dogs--Eight healthy adult female dogs were given prednisolone acetate 2mg/kg/day IM for 3 weeks. They were then randomly divided into ST36 and control groups of 4 dogs each. In the ST36 group, ST36 was treated bilaterally with EA for 30 minutes, 3 times per week, for 3 consecutive weeks. For the control, a non-locus point on M. brachialis was treated bilaterally with the same protocol. After the first week of EA, the serum cortisol levels of the ST36 and control groups were 0.9 +/- 0.1 and 0.5 +/- 0.1 micrograms/dl (P less than 0.005) baseline and 2.5 +/- 0.2 and 1.4 +/- 0.4 micrograms/dl (p less than 0.05) and after ACTH stimulation test, respectively. After the third week of EA treatment, the results were 1.0 +/- 0.1 and 0.6 +/- 0.2 micrograms/dl (p less than 0.05) baseline and 4.0 +/- 0.5 and 1.7 +/- 0.5 micrograms/dl (p less than 0.001) after ACTH stimulation respectively. These data indicated that EA at ST36 could restore the adrenocortical hypofunction resulting from ICS in dogs.