The Effects of Acupuncture on Sp02 with an emphasis on patients recovering from 2019 SARS-CoV-2

Thesis

I believe Acupuncture can help increase blood oxygen levels in patients who have been diagnosed with Covid-Sars2 (Covid-19) and as a result have <90% saturation levels through to Hypoxemia and potential Cyanosis. This study will not be limited to Covid/Long-covid patients however the efforts here could potentially aid the recovery of what is currently a global pandemic.

What Are Blood Oxygen Levels?

Blood Oxygen saturation sometimes referred to as O2 sats, or Sp02 refers to how much oxygen is saturated in haemoglobin. Haemoglobin is a substance in your blood that binds with oxygen to carry it through the bloodstream to the organs, tissues, and cells of your body.

The process of our blood being saturated with oxygen begins in the alveoli in our lungs. These tiny air sacks exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide molecules in the bloodstream. When oxygen molecules pass through the alveoli, they bind to haemoglobin in the blood. Next, haemoglobin delivers oxygen to the body’s tissues, then returns carbon dioxide from the tissues to the alveoli.

The level of oxygen in your blood depends on several key factors:

The amount much oxygen you breathe in
How well the alveoli swap carbon dioxide for oxygen
The concentration levels of haemoglobin in our red blood cells
How well haemoglobin attracts oxygen

Most of the time our haemoglobin contains enough oxygen for what we need, but in some disease and illness this won’t always be the case.

Hypoxemia is a below-normal level of oxygen in your blood, specifically in the arteries. Hypoxemia is a problem related to breathing or circulation, and may result in various symptoms, such as shortness of breath. Each human blood cell contains around 270 million molecules of haemoglobin and even the slightest dip in our bodies ability to produce red blood cells can result in low haemoglobin.

Hypoxemia can be diagnosed by measuring the oxygen levels in a sample of blood taken from an artery (arterial blood gas). Normal arterial oxygen is approximately 75 to 100 millimetres of mercury (mm Hg). Values under 60 mm Hg usually indicate the need for supplemental oxygen. It can also be estimated by measuring the oxygen saturation of your blood using a pulse oximeter which is a small device that clips to your finger. This is the method I will be using as it’s also used in wards within the NHS. Normal pulse oximeter readings usually range from 95 to 100 percent. Values under 90 percent are considered low.

Common Causes of Hypoxemia

Covid-Sars2
Anaemia
Acute respiratory distress syndrome – ARDS
Asthma
Bronchitis
Congenital heart defects in children
Congenital heart disease in adults
COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) exacerbation — worsening of symptoms
Emphysema
Heart deformities
Interstitial lung disease
Medications, such as certain narcotics and anaesthetics, that depress breathing
Pneumonia
Pneumothorax (collapsed lung)
Pulmonary oedema (excess fluid in the lungs)
Pulmonary embolism (blood clot in an artery in the lung)
Pulmonary fibrosis (scarred and damaged lungs)
Sleep Apnoea
Smoking

Understanding Covid-19

Coronaviruses are a type of virus of which there are many different kinds, and some cause disease. In 2019 SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) was discovered which is classified as a disease type, which causes respiratory illness. The virus spreads primarily through droplets of saliva or discharge from the nose and other orifices.

The main symptoms of Covid-19 are a high temperature, a new continuous cough, and a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste.

However, to really understand Covid-19 so we can effectively treat any of its unwelcomed side effects we fist need to investigate how and why it lives of its hosts.

Covid-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, starts with droplets from an infected person’s cough, sneeze, or breath. They could be in the air or on a surface that you touch before touching your eyes, nose, or mouth. That gives the virus a passage to the mucous membranes in your throat.

The virus moves further down your respiratory tract where there’s increased ACE2 receptors. This is one of the reasons Covid-19 is more likely to go deeper than viruses like the common cold.

Just like all viruses, Covid-19 infects your body by entering healthy cells. Once inside, the virus makes copies of itself and multiplies throughout your body. Covid-19 has spiky surface proteins which latch to the receptors on healthy cells, especially those in your lungs. Your lungs might become inflamed, making it tough for you to breathe. This can lead to pneumonia, an infection of the alveoli inside your lungs where your blood exchanges oxygen and carbon dioxide.

Once inside, the coronavirus hijacks healthy cells and takes command. Eventually, it kills some of the healthy cells.

Within 2 to 14 days, your immune system may respond with symptoms including:

Fever
A cough
Shortness of breath or trouble breathing
Fatigue
Chills, sometimes with shaking
Body aches
Headache
A sore throat
Congestion or a runny nose
Loss of taste
Loss of smell
Nausea or vomiting
Diarrhoea

For most people, the symptoms end with a cough and a fever and more than 8 in 10 cases are mild. But for some, the infection gets more severe and about 5 to 8 days after symptoms begin, they have dyspnoea, and this is often followed by Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS).

ARDS can cause rapid breathing, a fast heart rate, dizziness, and sweating. It damages the tissues and blood vessels in your alveoli, causing debris to collect inside them. This makes it harder or even impossible for you to breathe. As fluid collects in your lungs, they carry less oxygen to your blood. That means your blood may not supply your organs with enough oxygen to survive. This can cause your kidneys, lungs, and liver to shut down and stop working.

The Study

We started with 3 male, and 3 female patients all confirmed at having Covid-19, and now as a result suffering from Long-covid symptoms. It’s important to note at this point I was unbale to obtain patients on day 1 of their isolation period being lifted as this would have yielded the most accurate results, however with future planning this could be achieved. I also did not have any data on their health metrics prior to covid so this is purely based on how the readings are now and what they go down to and stay at.

Initially I approached this from an Eastern point of view and opted for the TCM route of diagnosis and treatment. In all 6 patients this brought up the kidney channel as the primary cause of the symptoms with a combination of Qi, liver, blood, and lungs in varying ratios across the board. I opted to treat all patients using what I feel is the strongest acupuncture treatment for kidneys which is the lower 3 Emperors by Master Tung.

Treatment 1 (lower 3 Emperors)	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was removed.
Male 1	94	99	97	97	98	97
Male 2	96	97	97	96	96	96
Male 3	92	99	97	99	97	95
Female 1	96	96	97	96	96	96
Female 2	94	97	98	96	97	97
Female 3	95	99	98	98	99	98

> denotes the Sp02 is healthier at the same time frame compared to the previous treatment.
< denotes the Sp02 is healthier at the same time frame compared to the previous treatment.
+ 7 days after prior treatment

Treatment 2+ (lower 3 Emperors)	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was removed.
Male 1	95>	98>	98>	98>	98	98>
Male 2	96	97	98>	97>	96	96
Male 3	94>	99	99>	99	97	97>
Female 1	95<	96	96<	95<	96	96
Female 2	94	97	98	96	97	97
Female 3	95	98<	98	98	97<	98

Treatment 3+ (lower 3 Emperors)	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 6^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 6^th needle was removed.
Male 1	95>	97<	97<	97<	98	98
Male 2	97>	97	97<	96<	96	96
Male 3	93<	98<	98<	99	99>	99>
Female 1	96>	96	97>	96>	96	97>
Female 2	95>	97	98	96	97	97
Female 3	96>	99>	98	98	98<	98

After 3 treatments all patients reported better symptoms across the board ranging from easily out of breath and fatigue, chest and muscle pains, headaches, sleep, and mood. However, the Sp02 trends were neither consistent nor positive. It was clear the treatments were having an affect but nothing which could be replicated repeatedly, hence not scientific. If this was going to work, it would have done by now.

My Thought process changed at this point, and I moved away from a pure cause treatment and opted for a cause and symptoms treatment consisting of KD2,3 for the cause element, and LV2,3, SP6,10 for their qualities on blood, as well as their close links with the kidney channel.

The problem when treating with acupuncture is there are various methods and beliefs surrounding diagnosing, needling, and what is possible. This is great if a therapist has the skills to mix and match and create a system they believe in, but not useful when it comes to proving beyond reasonable doubt it works.

Treatment 4+ (KD2,3 LV2,3 SP6,10)	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 12^th needle was removed.
Male 1	96>	96<	97	97	97<	97<
Male 2	97	98>	97	97>	98>	97>
Male 3	95>	96<	97<	98	97<	97<
Female 1	96	97>	97	96	97>	97
Female 2	95	96<	97<	97>	97	97
Female 3	95<	95<	95<	97>	97<	98

Treatment 5+ (KD2,3 LV2,3 SP6,10)	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 12^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 12^th needle was removed.
Male 1	95<	96	96<	97	97	97
Male 2	96<	97>	97	96<	96<	96<
Male 3	96>	97>	97	97<	97	97
Female 1	95<	97	96<	97>	97	96<
Female 2	95	95<	96<	97	96<	96<
Female 3	95	95	94<	96<	96<	97<

Treatments 4 and 5 yielded more consistent results, however not what I was hoping for. In my mind, if a patient leaves on a 97 reading, they shouldn’t return on a 95 or below.

Note, at this point all patients experienced a massive reduction in all symptoms to the point none of them felt they needed to continue treatments.
At this point I let all my case patients go, but with the agreement I could call them back if needed.

During a lecture by Dr. Jeremy Steiner on Bio-electric Medicine I came across the workings of the late Bob Beck, a Physicist from Dallas, USA.

Bob designed the Black Box Blood Cleaning device based on the research of Dr. Kaali who had used this type of electrification therapy to cure patients of the Aids virus. The research carried out by M.I.T and The Albert Einstein College of Medicine revealed the effectiveness of electric currents on all viral loads, and further says it does this by deactivating their ability to penetrate cells. This was around 1991/92 and used a device like a TENS machine which delivered a current into the body.

As we know the human body is extremely conductive once we bypass the skin which has the highest ohms with a rating of c50,000.

30 years on and we now know through further studies that this type of treatment is more effective when using a transdermal device with a voltage of 27 or above, or directly penetrating the body with either electro-acupuncture or a procedure which electrifies the blood externally and infuses back into the patient.

We also know by increasing the Zeta potential of the blood cells we can in fact stop all viral, bacterial, fungal, and parasite loads from leaving the blood and entering the deeper cells where they would normally hijack and start reproducing. This also has numerous other health benefits such as superior nutrient uptake ranging from 10 to 30 times greater. A colleague of mine Dr. Steven Zabrondky from Colarado USA has been performing this electro-acupuncture method in his clinic for a while now with tremendous results.

With one of the contributing factors in Sp02 being quality of blood I wanted to try this new method to see if I could elicit better results.

So I brought back Male 1 and Female 2

Treatment 6+	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted	Sp02 20-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was removed.
Male 1	95	96	96	98>	97	97
Female 2	95	97>	97>	97	97>	97>

Treatment 7+	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted	Sp02 20-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was removed.
Male 1	97>	98>	98>	98	98>	98>
Female 2	96>	98>	98>	97	97	97

Treatment 8+	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted	Sp02 20-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 40-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 60-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was removed.
Male 1	99>	100>	99>	99>	99>	99>
Female 2	97>	97<	98	98>	97	98>

Not only are these results consistent, but they appear to be lasting the full 7-days.

I had exhausted my control group and wanted to try this on a new patient, so I chose an existing patient who is an elderly female with many health issues. I don’t see her as often as I would like but I knew she has been issued her own Sp02 monitor by the hospital as she often drops below 90 and some days, she is below 80 which is at the brain damage level. It’s important to note she is on various medications and this treatment also increases nutrient uptake by 10-30 times unless a higher frequency is chosen. I knew this would interfere with the optimal results, however, would be optimal for her. We also decreased the treatment time to 30-minutes as she may experience a dye-off effect like a Jarisch Herxheimer reaction.

> denotes the Sp02 is healthier at the same time frame compared to the previous treatment.

< denotes the Sp02 is healthier at the same time frame compared to the previous treatment.

Both treatments were 7 days apart,

New Female	Sp02 before treatment, and after 10-minutes of laying supine	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 15-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 20-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 30-minutes after the 4^th needle was inserted.	Sp02 10-minutes after the 4^th needle was removed.
Treatment 1	90	93	93	95	96	96
Treatment 2	95>	97>	96>	96>	98>	98>
Treatment 3	96>	98>	97>	98>	99>	99>

The Outcome

Either I didn’t create an optimal treatment plan in the beginning, or acupuncture without electrical stimulation is not capable of increasing a patient’s Sp02 to the point it can be scientifically replicated time and time again and remain in a better position on return visits.

What’s Next?

Time ran away with me on this, and I didn’t factor in how much time and research it would take as well as taking in all the varying factors when conducting an experiment fairly. Also, all treatments were free of charge which also meant I was fitting them in where I could and some of the process could have been improved, including my data collection. After reflection it would have been good to have documented resting and variable heart rates during the sessions to see how they changed, as well as using a peak flow to record fast blast exhalation.

However, the more I have researched and learned, the less I feel the need to focus purely on Sp02 is needed, as there are many contributing factors that contribute to this single metric all of which have their own set of benefits. In fact, the new skills and knowledge obtained throughout this process has led me to completely change how I run my clinic.

Moving forward I would like to obtain funding to research in detail how bio-electric medicine impacts the body in further detail and how this can be used to irradicate the need for pharmaceutical drugs altogether. To do this I would require a starting kit consisting of a vital sign’s observation monitor and a USB digital darkfield microscope, both of which can be relatively inexpensive.

This has also re-sparked my desire to continue onto a masters/PHD which would allow me the time and funding required to carry out controlled studies which also holds validity when presenting my findings to a wider Western Medical field.