Acupuncture is a treatment of choice for sufferers of Bell's Palsy according to researchers at the First Affiliated Hospital, Hunan College of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Changsha. Using acupuncture with pressure on otopoints (a combination group of acupoints) to treat 86 patients with facial spasm the researchers found that the condition was successfully alleviated in over 95 percent of the patients. Simple acupuncture and simple pressure on otopoints were respectively applied in two other groups of patients as controls. The total effective rates in these two groups were 92.1 percent and 62.5 percent respectively. However, the cure rates were 38.4 per cent in the acupuncture with pressure on otopoints, 15.8 in acupuncture alone and 5 percent using pressure on otopoints alone respectively.

The differences in results of the three groups show significant statistical differences, indicating that the therapeutic effectiveness of the combined method of acupuncture with pressure on otopoints is far better than the two therapeutic methods used alone.