Acupuncure is the procedure of inserting and manipulating fine needles into various points on the body to relieve pain or for therapeutic purposes. Ancient texts described its mechanism based on meridian theory and assigned Qi as the medium of action. Meridians are pathways of Qi in our body and integrate our organs, muscles, and other tissues together. Qi, a sort of bioenergy flows through meridian to keep each part of a body coordinated smoothly.

When a person is exposed to a severe environment, strong emotions, or other pathogenic factors, Qi flow can be disturbed to cause functional problems in the body.They believe acupuncture stimulates and redistributes Qi to recover normal flow, eventually leading to normal functions of body.

There are tons of opinion on the machanism of acupuncture, but no standardized view is agreed on yet. Personally, Heayoon Park thinks acupuncture works partly through meridians and partly through microsystems. Microsystems are miniatures of the whole human body contained on a body mass, i.e. ears, hands, feet, or face etc.. When a well skilled practitioner stimulates the virtual organs in a specific microsystem, the real organ shows the changes aimed by the practitioner.

Moxibustion can be explained working through almost same mechanism of actions of acupuncture, however it uses not needles but heat from burning tiny amount of mugwart balls.