Acupuncture Alternative medicine, long dismissed by mainstream doctors, is getting a second look as many people in the United States have turned to acupuncture to treat a variety of problems. Proponents of acupuncture have accumulated many statistics and surveys in favor of this ancient method. Even though, many medical professionals still question its validity due to the discovery of adverse effects of acupuncture and problems in researching alternative medicines. Acupuncture is defined as the "art of healing by the inserting of needles into specific points of the body for therapeutic purposes" (Weiss 70). Needles that ar