[Acupuncture treatment for a patient with diffuse axonal injury--report no. 2].

ABSTRACT

Acupuncture has been applied as a therapeutic technique in China, Japan and East Asia. Recently, its application is extended to treat neural injuries. We describe a 26-year-old man with consciousness disturbance and intense muscle spasticity of extremities due to severe diffuse axonal injury (DAI) in whom acupuncture treatment for 1 month was effective to alleviate these symptoms remarkably. We also investigated the cerebral blood flow two times by 123I-IMP SPECT in acupuncture period. Acupuncture treatment may be effective to improve consciousness disturbance and intense spasticity of DAI and to modulate cerebral blood flow.