POSTER PRESENTATION ABSTRACTS
Please note: All posters will be displayed in Salons 10-12.

FRIDAY, 5:45-6:30 PM


Park K, Lee J, Kim J.

Acupuncture on L4(Hegu) of different sides have different effects on pupil size change.

Department of Biomedical Engineering Kyung Hee University saenim@khu.ac.kr

PURPOSE: To investigate the different effects of the acupuncture on left and right side body, we observed the effect of lateralized acupoint and non-acupoint stimulation on the pupil size change

METHODS: 11 subjects, 20-24 years old males, participated in the different four kinds of sensory stimulation (combination of 'left and right side of body' and 'acupoint and non-acupoint') experiments. LI4(hegu) was selected as an acupoint and index finger did as a non-acupoint. After the dark adaptation of subject in the 0.5 lux-dark room, we acquired the pupil image of subject with IR-camera based binocular system with 10 frames/sec during 5 minutes (One minute before the acupuncture, next one minute during acupuncture manipulation for deqi, and lastly three minutes during acupuncture insertion).

RESULT: For every four experiments, the left pupil sizes was as same as right one at the respective experiment, and during one minutes after sensory stimulation, pupil dilated as compared with the first one minute as a base. However, during last three minutes, pupil size did not change in the case of right side acupoint stimulation in contrast to other three cases that pupil shrinks obviously. And the subjective pain level of participants is largest at left side non-acupoint and the others show the same level. The result of our non-acupoint stimulation agrees with other researches that left side show lower pain threshold. But there was no different pain threshold between both sides in the case of our acupoint stimulations.

CONCLUSIONS: The most important thing is that the pupil size was obviously smaller at the left side acupoint stimulation than at the right side acupoint stimulation. To the contrary, the pupil sizes at the left and right side non-acupoint stimulation shows the same tendency. The results can be inferred that left side acupoint stimulation triggers more activation of opioid system rather than right side. And also, it can be interpreted that the lateralized activation of brain and limbic system induced by lateralized acupoint stimulation affects the Edinger-Westphal nucleus as the mediator of myosis. Furthermore, the relation with lateralized acupuncture and brain lateralization will be investigated concerned with pupil size parameters, brain activities and clinic efficacy.

 

Back