Acupuncture is the most popular adjuvant and alternative therapy in China, and it has been used for thousands of years. Electro-acupuncture is an innovation of traditional Chinese acupuncture, which improves the clinical effect by transmitting electrical pulses to the needle.
Acupuncture treatment, which includes manual acupuncture (MA), electro-acupuncture (EA) and other types or other forms, has been used for a variety of conditions including weigh loss.
There is experimental evidence that acupuncture not only reduces body weight, but also increases adiponectin (Decreased adiponectin levels are thought to play a central role in the development of type 2 diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease in humans) in obese rats.
In addition, clinical trials show that acupuncture can reduce not only body weight and fat content, but also obesity-related complications, such as serum pro-oxidant antioxidant imbalance, dyslipidemia, and inflammation
Based on literature, it is assumed that Electro-acupuncture can reduce body weight via the browning of White Adipose Tissue, and that the therapeutic effect of it in obesity involves neuro-immune cross-talk mechanisms.
***White adipose tissue (WAT) or white fat is one of the two types of adipose tissue found in mammals. Brown fat, also called brown adipose tissue, is a special type of body fat that is turned on (activated) when you get cold. Brown fat produces heat resulting in calorie burn.
The use of electroacupuncture for weight loss is recommended in combination with a healthy balanced diet and physical activity
References
Lu M, He Y, Gong M, Li Q, Tang Q, Wang X, Wang Y, Yuan M, Yu Z, Xu B. Role of Neuro-Immune Cross-Talk in the Anti-obesity Effect of Electro-Acupuncture. Front Neurosci. 2020 Feb 28;14:151. doi: 10.3389/fnins.2020.00151. PMID: 32180699; PMCID: PMC7059539.
Ma FQ, Sun CJ, Wei JJ, Wang YD, Shen JC, Chang JJ. Electro-acupuncture regulates glucose metabolism in chronic stress model rats. Sci Rep. 2020 Jul 9;10(1):11281. doi: 10.1038/s41598-020-68132-w. PMID: 32647204; PMCID: PMC7347532.