Excerpt "The first time I tried acupuncture, I was nervous. I wasn’t afraid of needles, per se, but the idea of someone poking them into my skin still made me highly uncomfortable. But to my pleasant surprise, I found acupuncture to be nothing like I thought it would be. Many studies have found acupuncture to be as effective as commonly used insomnia medications. In one study, patients either received acupuncture once per week or took 10 mg of zolpidem every night. Both groups showed similar improvements in sleep quality, suggesting that the acupuncture treatment was as effective as the pharmaceutical treatment. But whereas drug treatment can result in serious side effects, acupuncture had little side effects and is generally quite safe." read more