S3cretz Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 Being stung by a bee would have most people rushing to hospital, expect at one Beijing clinic where patients queue up to be pricked into good health.Bee sting therapy, which involves placing live bees on a patient's body at certain pressure points, dates back over 3 000 years in China and was considered legal in 2007.It is similar to acupuncture in that it uses bees stingers instead of needles and the same principles, but the bees' toxin, which doctors say is a natural medicine, is essential, making the treatment like an injection.Doctors at the Kang Tai Bee Clinic, a traditional Chinese medical facility in northeast Beijing, say the therapy has proved effective in curing diseases such as rheumatism and arthritis, as well as a list of other ailments.Good poison"The bee therapy has an obvious effect on patients with bone and joint diseases," said Wang Jing, a doctor at the clinic."This treatment relies mainly on the bees' poison, which can help blood circulation, reduce inflammation and ease pain."The bees used for the treatment are a hybrid of species from Italy and the Gulf, and are kept on the clinic grounds. Their 0.3mm-long stings, which contain about 0.3mg of toxin, make them suitable for the therapy, doctors say.For the treatment, doctors use tweezers to pick up bees from the hive, placing them one by one on the pressure point of the painful area.The bee then instinctively stings its "enemy" and dies. The stinger is then left in the body for several hours, and patients say it helps to ease their discomfort.The doctors, who undergo strict training, decide how long the stinger should stay in the body, and how many bees should be used in the treatment. At the very most, a patient can be stung more than a hundred times. At the very least, four or five times.PopularThe centre sees an average of 30 patients daily, while more than 50 can queue up during weekends. Doctors say that the treatment has become so popular that they are considering expanding the clinic in the next year.Some patients even travel long distances from remote areas of China to try out the unique treatment, which at around $18, is much cheaper than most conventional medical treatments.Han Lide, a patient suffering from an inflammation in the veins caused by diabetes, has been treated at the clinic seven times and insists the results are worth the initial discomfort."After I am stung by the bees, the pain is gone by the afternoon. My legs feel lighter. It becomes easier to walk and my legs do not feel swollen," he said.Doctor say more than 90% of their patients have recovered or felt an improvement in their condition after receiving treatment.Despite the pain, patients often continue the treatment for many years. Cai Shulan has used bees to treat her arthritis for five years."I couldn't move my shoulders before. I needed someone to help me get dressed. It was too painful to even put on clothes. After being treated here I feel fine and I am just like a normal person," she said. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karachidude Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 Please put the source of the article ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HX1 Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 You know last summer I had an odd thing happen to me.. I have pain in my right shoulder neck area, ( right between my spine and shoulder blade.. usually as a result of computer usage.. I had been doing intensive work on the computer for about 3 days... It hurt fairly badly.. and intensified when I started working on a desktop.. I stepped outside for some air... and felt something on my neck area. I flinched and reached back and found a Bee.. I had surprised him enough that he stung me...as soon as I touched him.. Weird thing was at first I felt like a slight pressure.. I had to pull the stinger out of my neck and was expecting to have to go and get some Benadryl. Having been stung before from Black Scorpions to Wasps... I was expecting something painful and some swelling to follow.. After about a minute the slight pressure/pain from the sting subsided.. ALL of it.. my shoulder pain from the computer... which I didn't notice till later had vanished at the same time.. It did swell a little but it was SO worth it..LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
majithia23 Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 good for you heath ! :)well , its a proven fact and some thing which is still undergoing extensive research , that the poisons in the insect world in spite of being lethal also have a flip side to it .flip side being the medicinal values ...!!for example -- the venom of some snakes is being used for treating cancers . targeted cancer cell killing with the venom .(p.s. -- if the bee which stung you was a queen bee , it just committed a suicide . becoz a queen bee can sting only once and after stinging , it dies ! ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zombiegod Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 good for you heath ! :)(p.s. -- if the bee which stung you was a queen bee , it just committed a suicide . becoz a queen bee can sting only once and after stinging , it dies ! ;)No. The queen bee has a smooth sting and can, if need be, sting skin-bearing creatures multiple times. The queen does not leave the hive under normal conditions.It is widely believed that a worker honey bee can sting only once, this is a partial misconception: although the sting is in fact barbed so that it lodges in the victim's skin, tearing loose from the bee's abdomen and leading to its death in minutes, this only happens if the victim is a mammal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karachidude Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 good for you heath ! :)(p.s. -- if the bee which stung you was a queen bee , it just committed a suicide . becoz a queen bee can sting only once and after stinging , it dies ! ;)No. The queen bee has a smooth sting and can, if need be, sting skin-bearing creatures multiple times. The queen does not leave the hive under normal conditions.It is widely believed that a worker honey bee can sting only once, this is a partial misconception: although the sting is in fact barbed so that it lodges in the victim's skin, tearing loose from the bee's abdomen and leading to its death in minutes, this only happens if the victim is a mammal.good knowledge :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HX1 Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 In some insects the 'sacs' which contain the toxin actually stay attached to the stinger and continue to pump in the toxin.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toshiro Posted March 22, 2010 Share Posted March 22, 2010 Heath, there's a therapy... :lol:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life/health-fitness/health/Now-a-bee-sting-therapy/articleshow/5711953.cmsQuite interesting tho..@ TS.. plz add the source for your article. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
*dcs18 Posted March 23, 2010 Share Posted March 23, 2010 This therapy is recognized and has been categorized by 'The Guinness World Records.' ^_^ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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