The NHS will in future offer acupuncture to patients suffering back pain as part of new guidelines from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).
This is the first time NICE has formally backed the use of complementary therapies.
NICE believes that using active therapies – such as acupuncture and spinal manipulation – to treat back pain is preferable to early use of X-rays and MRI scans, whose benefits it says are questionable.
Professor Peter Littlejohns, NICE clinical and public health director, said: “This new guideline means that for the first time we now have the means for a consistent national approach to managing low back pain. Importantly, patients whose pain is not improving should have access to a choice of different therapies including acupuncture, structured exercise and manual therapy.”
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