Where this comes from
This Is Not Something We Invented for Menopause
The five point protocol was developed in New York in the 1970s and brought to Britain in 1991, where it was set up inside an NHS drug service in London. More than 30,000 practitioners have been trained in it here since, from NHS staff and nurses to prison officers and addiction workers.
It is used in NHS mental health and addiction services, in prisons and probation, in refugee and disaster relief work, and in NHS cancer care.
The same five points. The same forty minutes sitting quietly. Whatever the room.
It reached menopause care through cancer services, treating women who were having flushes on tamoxifen and could not take HRT. An NHS service in Hertfordshire ran it as an eight week course on that basis for fifteen years.
What we can and cannot tell you
The published work on hot flushes specifically is honest rather than spectacular. Women in those NHS services reported meaningful improvement, but the studies had no comparison group, so nobody can separate the needles from the time, the quiet and the attention.
We are comfortable saying that out loud. It has never been the needles alone.
So we will not tell you what this will do for your flushes. We will tell you exactly what happens in the room, and let you judge it after four sessions.
On safety, this treatment has been generally well tolerated across the published work, with serious problems not emerging as a concern. Minor needling discomfort, small bruises and occasional light-headedness do happen. We would rather say that plainly than tell you it is risk-free.