Bladder Luo-connecting channel

Search the Whole Web to quickly find what you're looking for:

Alternatively, if you just want to search THIS SITE, use the Site Search box below: just type the word you're interested in, click 'Search' and away you go! Our trained acupuncture needles will go to work. They're all sharp, smooth, well-toned, keen and quite painless.

Search THIS Site - Type in the word you want ...
site search by freefind

The Bladder Luo-connecting channel is quite short, but still very influential in what it does. It is an acupuncture channel, and its pathway and properties were discovered by the Chinese well over 2000 years ago

Note to readers! ... 

This page is a bit abstruse if you're a beginner. It's not that the words are any, or at least, much, more difficult than on other pages, but this is about a subject usually taught some way into acupuncture courses. 

So some of the concepts need your familiarity with other ideas in Chinese medicine.

Actually, I did this page, and other luo-connecting channel pages, for a few insistent patients, and for me. 

It means I can look up both the channel and its symptoms  on my smartphone in case I forget them. 

If it helps others, great.

For more information about this type of acupuncture channel, click on luo-connecting channels.

Pathway

  • The Bladder Luo channel pathway commences at UB-58 - Bladder 58 - on the posterior lateral aspect of the leg.
  • It circles round and through the leg to link up with the Kidney primary channel.

Symptoms of Bladder Luo channel

Luo-connecting channels have great influence, so giving Bladder 58 considerable power in removing stuck Qi along the channel's pathway, and also from areas influenced by it or by the Kidneys. For example, 

  • Severe pain, cramp or contraction in the joints along the pathways of the Kidney or Bladder channels, caused by external pathogenic factors like Cold. An example might be severe neck pain from exposure to a draft.
  • Where the skin along the main Bladder pathway is traumatised, showing broken capillaries or greatly enlarged veins, indicating Blood stasis.
  • Damp in the Bladder luo might show as great stiffness and heaviness, possibly with some swelling, in the posterior thigh, poplitea or calf.
  • Where on palpation of the skin along the Bladder channel's pathway, it feels surprisingly hard in places, like nodules under the skin or in the muscles, the diagnosis is of a Full or Excess condition in the Luo channel.

Additionally, there are various symptoms which point to syndromes of this luo-channel, especially where along the Bladder channel:

  • Fullness in the Bladder luo: headache, congestion of the nose, backache (anywhere in the back, but specially in the lower back)
  • Emptiness: epistaxis (nosebleed); clear discharge from the nose. Emptiness usually occurs after a time when an external factor has invaded, possibly because of ongoing deficiency.
  • Qi Stagnation: sense of swelling or distension in the hypogastric region ie below the umbilicus; may particularly occur before urination
  • Blood Stasis: blood in urine; pain - stabbing or lancinating - during urination
  • Heat in the deep luo: Heat usually comes with urgency, a sense of heat of fever, inflammation, and in the case of fluids produced, with blood eg in the urine, and thirst. In this case, there is often hypogastric pain as well.

Comment

Knowing how to treat the Luo-connecting vessels gives acupuncturists great flexibility and understanding of how pain and discomfort accumulate in the body, and how this trapped Qi can be helped.

The luo-connecting points have many attributes, including the ability to stop bleeding and ease pain.

They also have mental potential, helping to calm patients when used correctly for the appropriate syndromes. In so far as I've been able to discern the specific mental condition for this particular luo, it seems to be that of a slightly frightened or worried resignation, with irritation at the physical conditions such as back pain or bleeding haemorrhoids.

Links to Luo-connecting channels

Find an Acupuncturist!

If you live in the Edinburgh area of Scotland, where the author of this site (and of the books described below) works, click on Edinburgh Acupuncturist.

If you live elsewhere, click on BAcC.

Jonathan Clogstoun-Willmott Books

All the books in the 'Chinese Medicine in English' series should be fully accessible on Kindles and Kindle apps. (Or you can buy the softback print editions, of course.)

('Western Astrology and Chinese Medicine' published 1986, was never available in a Kindle version.)

Request! Please!

If, having read one of my books you can write a review - preferably positive - that would help others decide whether to read it.

You can put your review on Amazon or, on this site, here.

And if you think it was terrible?

Well, let me know so I can improve it for the next person. (Ideally let me know before cursing it in public!)

Here are some of the books I (Jonathan) have written.

Subscribers to Kindle Unlimited can borrow the first four for 'free'.

Qi Stagnation - Signs of Stress

Yin Deficiency - Burnout and Exhaustion

Yang Deficiency - Get Your Fire Burning Again!

Yuck! Phlegm! How to Clear Your Phlegm ...

Western Astrology and Chinese Medicine

For what people think about 'Qi Stagnation - Signs of Stress' click here!

See what people have said about Yin Deficiency - Burnout and Exhaustion!

Be the first to review Yang Deficiency (and get yourself some glory!)

Published 1986 and, amazingly, still selling. Western Astrology and Chinese Medicine was apparently used back then by at least one acupuncture college to help students understand Chinese medicine! See Reviews.

Seven Reviews so far for Yuck Phlegm. (Despite the lurid cover, it explains the five main types of phlegm and what works best for each type. I hope it's easy to read and will be much more useful than all the websites on the subject.)

3000 years of Chinese being stressed, and at last, here's a book showing how all that experience can help you!

By the author of this website, it explains in simple English how to use stress to improve and enhance your life.

For the Latest Reviews of 'Qi Stagnation', click here!

NB You can also order 'Qi Stagnation - Signs of Stress' from your bookseller.

Click for the Kindle edition:

Click for the Paperback edition:

Didn't find what you were looking for? Use this search feature:

Click Here for Acupuncture Points on Facebook!