In three recent articles published in Acupuncture in Medicine, the possible role of acupuncture in tissue healing has been highlighted. In an article on the hypothetical action of acupuncture in the treatment of tendinopathy in the December 2012 issue of the journal, Neal and Longbottom assert that tendinopathy and tendinalgia are debilitating conditions for which a gold standard treatment strategy does not exist.1 This is probably due to the fact that the pathophysiology of tendalgia is not well understood. However, Neal and Longbottom suggest that there is evidence—small in amount but high in quality—supporting the theory that acupuncture may be able to influence tendon healing by increasing blood flow via local vasodilation and increasing collagen proliferation, and that these effects are most likely the result of an increased release of the neuropeptide calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) from sensory nerve endings. Two pathways for the vasodilation of CGRP have…