Insomnia Due to Heart Disease
A local support group for heart and stroke patients asked me recently to give a talk about acupuncture and Chinese medicine at one of their monthly meetings. One gentleman approached me afterwards and said that he had not slept well since his heart bypass surgery, which had been about three years earlier. This did not surprise me, as the Heart in Chinese medicine is said to house the spirit and has a lot to do with the body’s ability to sleep peacefully. Since the problem was becoming really worrisome (he only slept two hours a night), and he did not want to add another medication to his long list of prescriptions, he decided he had nothing to lose by trying acupuncture treatments.
We started weekly treatments. I used points that are well known to calm the mind and nourish the heart to help sleep. For a couple of weeks, he would sleep better for a night or two only to return to the same pattern of two hours a night. After four treatments he was getting discouraged, and even though I did not expect to turn around a three year-old habit overnight, I was searching all of my materials for the best protocol for his constitution.