Tapas Acupressure Technique
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Tapas Acupressure Technique (or TAT) is a controversial complementary healing modality promoted to clear negative emotions and past traumas. Though the full technique was invented in 1993 by Tapas Fleming, a licensed acupuncturist in California, TAT incorporates elements of and builds on other acupressure techniques. Like other energy therapies, TAT relies on a putative energy for which no scientific basis has been found and no biophysical means of action determined.[1][2]
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[edit] History
Invented in 1993 by Ms. Tapas Fleming, a California licensed acupuncturist, TAT is marketed as "an easy process for ending traumatic stress, reducing allergic reactions, and freeing yourself of negative beliefs." It is also promoted as a tested treatment for weight loss following an ambivalent preliminary study funded by Kaiser Permanente and National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.[3] The underlying idea claims that trauma leads to a blockage of the natural flow a putative energy. Practitioners of TAT claim that application of light pressure to four areas (inner corner of both eyes, one-half-inch above the space between the eyebrows, and the back of head) while placing attention on a series of steps releases this blockage and allows for healing.
[edit] Scientific study
A preliminary unblinded randomized trial of Tapas Acupressure Technique found a possible weak correlation with weight loss maintenance using TAT versus Qigong or self-directed support, suggesting that TAT might outperform the other methods studied. The results were not statistically significant, but a separation test indicated that further study might be warranted.[3] A full randomized trial of TAT versus standard weightloss management intervention is currently being conducted, funded by the NCCAM.[4]
No scientifically plausible method of action is proposed for Tapas Acupressure Technique, instead relying on unvalidated putative energy and meridians with no identified biophysical or histological basis. A 2005 review of so-called "Power Therapies" concluded that TAT and similar techniques "offered no new scientifically valid theories of action, show only non-specific efficacy, show no evidence that they offer substantive improvements to extant psychiatric care, yet display many characteristics consistent with pseudoscience."[2] TAT also conforms to the "nine practices of pseudoscience" as identified by AR Pratkins.[5]
[edit] References
- ^ The 'National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (October 13 2006). Energy Medicine Overview.
- ^ a b Grant J. Devilly (2005). "Power Therapies and possible threats to the science of psychology and psychiatry". Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry 39: 437–445. doi:.
- ^ a b Mist, S.; C. Elder, M. Aikin, C Ritenbaugh (2005). "Phase I/II randomized trial of Tapas Acupressure for weightloss maintenance". Focus on Alternative and Complementary Therapies 10: 38–9.
- ^ Elder, Charles R.. Randomized Trial of Tapas Acupressure Technique for Weightloss Maintenance. Retrieved on 2008-02-11.
- ^ AR Pratkins. How to sell a pseudoscience.
