Everybody speaks of the Empirical points with such high regard. While studying we all try to get as much "good" information as we can during our studies, but in my searches for empirical points for certaon conditions I have only been able to collect what I hear & have not been able to find a good text which lists these points. Does anyone out there have any tips??
Comment by Chad J. Dupuis, L.Ac.
I would say two things about this - well three really. First, I don't know of a text that has a large comprehensive list of these. The main comment I would make on the subject is why? Knowing that acupuncture is not a point - to - condition modality, empirical points are somewhat counter to the "proper" usage of the medicine. This is most likely why the lists are usually on the shorter side. We are, however, in the process of "automatically" creating such lists within our new conditions section. If you click on the "conditions" tab above and go to a particular condition (anxiety, for example) you will see a list of "useful" acupuncture points on the right hand side a little ways down. We are only through a few of the meridians now (11/01/10), so this will get finished as time permits. We are also building a TCM pattern database which will collect similar information for herb, herbal formulas, and acupuncture points per pattern (so LV 3 for LV Qi Stagnation for example, along with Xiao Yao Wan, etc.). These will be more empirical in nature, otherwise the list will get overwhelming and less useful. Those pages, however, are still very much in production and are not even properly laid out yet. When this is finished, however, the site will be far more useful from a practitioner perspective - including brain jogs, reminders on less used points, things you might not have thought of for a particular condition, etc...