re: quitting smoking and ear seeds- A Traditional Therapy Finds Modern Uses

QUITTING cigarettes had always been agony for Michele Fenzl, a 55-year-old computer operator from Denver. Pregnancy got her to stop for a while. But in 35 years of smoking a pack a day, nothing else gave her a reprieve.

Last June, her acupuncturist, Karen Kurtak of the Frontier Medical Institute, started affixing tiny black seeds of a Vaccaria plant to specific points on her ears, to quell cravings between twice-weekly sessions with needles.

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“They are used for people in situations of trauma, for example in the aftermaths of 9/11, Katrina, the California wildfires,” said Cynthia Neipris, an acupuncturist in New York and the director of outreach and community education for the Pacific College of Oriental Medicine, which trains students to use ear seeds. “And, because the seeds are worn home, it’s an added plus because it involves the patient in their own healing process.”

It is not known precisely how ear seeds work nor has enough research been done to prove which ailments they help relieve. But licensed acupuncturists as well as doctors from world-class hospitals recommend them.

Dr. P. Grace Harrell, an anesthesiologist and an acupuncturist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston who uses seeds and acubeads to help treat back pain, suggests they may stimulate activity in the brain.