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Cupping

About Dr Amer Hussain Agha

Cupping (in English), AL-HAJAMA (in Arabic) is an ancient therapy which was widely used in folk medicine around the world and is still used by modern practitioners. Cupping is a particularly useful therapy for the treatment of muscular aches and pains such as back ache, 
frozen shoulder and so on.

How Cupping works:
Cupping involves the application of glass cups to specific areas of the body, this is achieved by holding a small flame inside the cup to create a vacuum. The cups are then placed quickly on the skin over the point or area to be treated and left in place for up to 15 minutes. (The strength of the vacuum is modulated by the size of the flame, the length of time the cup is exposed to the flame, and how quickly the cup is placed on the chosen part of the skin).

Now a days there is another way to create vacuum by using pump type cups. Put the cup on the right spot. Attach the pump to the nipple of the cup and evacuate the air. It is easy to adjust the amount of suction required with the help of these pumps by releasing the nipple lock.

The vacuum causes the skin to be sucked up into the cup encouraging a small volume of blood to be collected into the cup.
The strong vacuum created by the cupping can leave the patient with minor bruises, which usually disappear in few days.
Occasionally moving cupping is applied, by lubricating the skin with a thin layer of oil, which allows the cups to slide over the skin, applying suction to a large area.

Chinese Version regarding Cupping:
When pain is felt, it is due to a lack of oxygen to the cells regardless of the cause or type of pain. When the blood and lymph circulation is sluggish or compromised in an area or cannot be spread due to clogging by the waste products. The Chinese call this, “Blood Poison”. Than cupping is indicated. This is carried out on the back of the patient. 
To get better results, now a day, during a treatment session cupping is typically combined with acupuncture also.
Duo Xiuying, (Tianjin Muncipal Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Pharmacy, Tianjin 300020, China.) has treated 100 cases (38 males and 62 females of different age groups, 18-50 years) of intractable migraine by acupuncture and cupping with satisfactory therapeutic results.
He selected an area located on the left or right side, 4.5 cm lateral to the midline of the back, parallel to the inferior border of the third thoracic vertebra, for acupuncture and cupping. 
Strong stimulation by acupuncture quickly relieves the pain, and cupping following acupuncture brings about rapid elimination of pain.
Chinese say the patient is “open” to the outside through these procedures and the patient can get cold or flu, quickly. They also advice few precautionary measures for the next 24 hours to the 
patient after cupping, i.e; no alcohol , no smoking marijuana, no cold drinks, and no sex. Keep the area lightly covered and warm for 24 hours.

Practice of cupping (Al-Hajama) in Saudi Arabia:
In spite of the fact that cupping is a famous and traditional way of treating various ailments in kingdom, it is illegal in most parts of the kingdom, e.g; it is banned in the Holy City of Makkah Al-Mukarama, but legal in the Holy city of Madina Al-Munawara. 

The Prophet’s guidance for cupping:
Al-Bukhari narrated that the Prophet (mpuh) said;

“there is cure in three substances, a drink of honey, a slash with a knife used for cupping and cauterizing by fire. I forbid my nation from cauterizing by fire.”

Abu Abdullah Al Maziri said, plethoric conditions are either sanguineous (bloody), bilious, phlegmy, or melancholic. Curing sanguineous plethora entails extracting the blood. Some people said that when the slash by a cupping knife does not work, the last resort is branding by ire (cauterizing). The Prophet (mpuh) mentioned branding by fire as a last resort when the body has a 
strong resistance against medicine, rendering it ineffective. The Prophet (mpuh) then said, “I forbid my Ummah for branding by fire (cauterizing), and in another narration, “ I do not like to be branded by fire”
Ibn Majah narrated in his Sunan that the messenger of Allah (mpuh) said;

“During the night of Israa (the overnight journey from Makkah to Jerusalem and then to the heavens”, every company (of angels) that I passed by would say, “O! Muhammad! Order your nation to use cupping” .

Also in the Sahihan, it is narrated that the Prophet (mpuh) once had his blood cupped (medically) and paid the person who 
applied the cupping. The prophet (mpuh) then said;

“Cupping is among your best remedies”

Various other Prophet’s sayings regarding cupping;

“Cupping and puncturing the veins are your best remedies”

“The Messenger of Allah used to apply cupping on the two jugular veins and the upper part of the back on the seventeenth, nineteenth or twenty-first day of the month.” [Abu Dawud, Al-Tirmidhi, Ibn Majah, and al-Hakim].

In addition, Abu Dawud narrated that Jabir said that the Prophet (mpuh) used cupping on his hip because of a debilitation he 
suffered from.

“Use cupping on the nape cavity, for it cures seventy two kinds of ailments” .

“ Those who have cupping on the seventeenth, nineteenth or twenty-first will be cured from every disease.” 

“So that the septic blood does not cause death to one of you”.

References:
1) www.khayama.com
2) www.alriadh.com.sa/eidah
3) www.islamonline.net
4) www.islamweb.net
5) Healing with the Medicine of the Prophet (mpuh); by Imam Ibn qayyim Al-Jauziyah, USA.
6) “Al Badayail e Tibya” by Dr. Samya Hamza Azam.