GB-29 (Ju Liao) Squatting Bone Hole

What does GB-29 Ju Liao do?

Ju Liao GB-29 is the point of the outer hip — it lies midway between the bony point at the front of the pelvis and the prominence of the thigh bone at the side — and its recorded work is to activate the channel and alleviate pain, and to benefit the hip joint. Sacred Lotus sources & references record those two actions and classify it as a Meeting Point of the Gall Bladder channel with the Yang Motility Vessel. It carries no five-shu, source, connecting, cleft, back-shu or front-mu classification. Two short actions, and both of them local: this is a hip point, and the tradition does not claim otherwise.

• Benefits the hip joint — the defining action. GB-29 sits directly over the muscles that stabilise the hip from the side and close to the joint itself, which is as literal a relationship between a point and a structure as acupuncture offers. Restricted, painful or weak movement at the hip, difficulty in rotating or abducting the thigh, and pain on standing on one leg are what it is chosen for.
• Activates the channel and alleviates pain — the channel action. The Gall Bladder channel runs down the outer side of the body from the head to the fourth toe, and its course over the hip and outer thigh is exactly where GB-29 lies. Pain along that outer line — hip, outer thigh, outer knee — is treated from points on it, and GB-29 is the highest of the leg's.
• Reaches the Yang Motility Vessel — the consequence of the meeting-point classification. The Yang Qiao Mai governs the outer side of the body, the lifting and turning-out of the leg, and the balance of the two sides in standing and walking. A point where the Gall Bladder channel and that vessel cross, sited over the muscles that hold the pelvis level when one leg takes the weight, has a coherence that is worth noticing — and, as it happens, the one modern trial of this point measured exactly those muscles.
• Dispels wind-damp from the hip and thigh — the classical framing behind its use in the bi (painful obstruction) patterns of the lower limb, where cold and damp are held to have lodged in the channels.

A note on scope, because GB-29 sits next to a much more famous point. Huan Tiao GB-30 is the great point of the hip and the whole lower limb, and it carries a longer list of actions including atrophy and paralysis of the leg. GB-29 is not a smaller version of GB-30; it is a different point in a different place, over different muscles, and its recorded actions are correspondingly narrower. Where GB-30 is the point for pain radiating down the leg, GB-29 is the point for the hip itself. Both are held here.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (channel, the Meeting Point classification, and the existing action record — reformatted here from a broken bare list run; the GB-30 record queried directly); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 446; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 217; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.

What is GB-29 Ju Liao used for?

Ju Liao GB-29 is used for pain and restriction at the hip, for pain and numbness of the thigh and lumbar region, and for weakness or wasting of the lower limb. The indications carried in Sacred Lotus sources & references are pain and numbness in the thigh and lumbar region, paralysis, and muscular atrophy of the lower limbs. The standard reference literature sets them out more fully below. These describe traditional use, not proven treatment.

• Pain of the hip and outer buttock
• Restricted movement of the hip — difficulty raising, rotating or turning out the thigh
• Pain and numbness of the thigh, particularly along its outer side
• Lumbar and low back pain
• Pain radiating from the hip down the outer leg
• Weakness, wasting or atrophy of the lower limb
• Paralysis and weakness of the leg after windstroke
• Unsteadiness or a dropped pelvis on standing on one leg
• Painful obstruction (bi) of the hip and thigh
• Swelling and pain of the outer knee, along the same channel line
• Pain of the lower abdomen and hernial disorders, in the classical record
• Painful, difficult urination, in the classical record

Why the leg-weakness indications are worth taking seriously here. Most points' "weakness of the lower limb" indications rest entirely on the classical record. GB-29's rest on that too — but they are also, unusually, the subject of the one modern trial that names this point, which electroacupunctured GB-29 in patients with one-sided weakness after stroke and measured what happened to the muscle beneath it. That study and its limits are set out in full under research.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (existing indication record, reformatted here as a list from a bare comma-run); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 446; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 217; PMID 40390617 — verified resolvable and checked for retraction status before citation; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.

Where is GB-29 Ju Liao, and how is it used in practice?

Ju Liao lies on the outer side of the hip, in the depression at the midpoint of a line drawn between two landmarks that can both be felt through the skin: the bony point at the front of the pelvis — the one you find if you press in and down from the waist at the front — and the prominence of the thigh bone at the side, the hard knob that rolls under the fingers when the leg is turned. Sacred Lotus sources & references hold two location records and they agree exactly, both placing the point midway between the anterior superior iliac spine and the prominence of the greater trochanter. There is no discrepancy between them to flag.

That location is worth understanding rather than memorising, because it explains the whole point. The stretch between those two landmarks is occupied by the muscles that hold the pelvis level when a person stands on one leg — the hip abductors. GB-29 sits over them. It also sits forward and above Huan Tiao GB-30, which lies on the back outer aspect of the hip, one third of the way from the greater trochanter toward the tailbone. The two points are often spoken of together and are genuinely different territory: GB-29 antero-lateral over the abductors and the hip joint capsule, GB-30 postero-lateral over the deep gluteal muscles and the sciatic nerve.

Which points is GB-29 combined with?

• With Huan Tiao GB-30 — the constant partner and the more used of the two, held here, classified in our own records as a Meeting Point of the Gall Bladder and Bladder channels and as a Ma Dan-yang Heavenly Star point. The pairing gives the front and back of the hip from one channel. In the piriformis-syndrome protocol described under research, GB-29 and GB-30 are used together.
• With Feng Shi GB-31 and Yang Ling Quan GB-34 — further down the same outer line, both held here. GB-31 sits on the outer thigh where the middle finger falls when the arm hangs at the side; GB-34 is the Hui-Meeting Point of the Sinews below the outer knee and the standard distal point for anything muscular or tendinous. A hip-and-leg treatment on the Gall Bladder channel is typically GB-29 or GB-30 above, GB-31 in the middle and GB-34 below.
• With Zhi Bian BL-54 and Cheng Fu BL-36 — Bladder-channel points on the buttock, both held here, added when the pain follows the back of the leg rather than the outer side.
• With Bi Guan ST-31 — on the front of the thigh at the hip, held here, giving the third aspect of the joint where GB-29 gives the side and GB-30 the back.
• With Wei Zhong BL-40 and Xuan Zhong GB-39 — distal points behind the knee and above the outer ankle, both held here; BL-40 the Command point of the back and GB-39 the Hui-Meeting Point for Marrow. Both appear with GB-29 in the piriformis protocol described below.
• With Dai Mai GB-26 and Wei Dao GB-28 — the Gall Bladder points on the side of the abdomen above GB-29, both held here and both classified in our own records as Meeting Points of the Gall Bladder channel with the Girdling Vessel. They are the next points up the same channel.
• With the extra point Huan Zhong — held here, and located in our own records midway between Huan Tiao GB-30 and Yao Shu DU-02, so on the buttock behind GB-29. It is used for the same hip, buttock and radiating leg pain.
• With Shen Mai BL-62 — the Confluent Point of the Yang Motility Vessel at the outer ankle, held here. Where GB-29 is being used as a Yang Qiao point rather than simply as a hip point, BL-62 is the vessel's master key and the theoretically consistent partner; Fu Yang BL-59, the vessel's Xi-Cleft point, is held here too.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (both location records; the BL-36, BL-40, BL-54, BL-59, BL-62, ST-31, GB-26, GB-28, GB-30, GB-31, GB-34, GB-39 and Huan Zhong records queried directly); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 446; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 217; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.

Where is GB-29 located?

• A Manual of Acupuncture (p. 446): On the lateral aspect of the hip joint, at the midpoint of a line drawn between the anterior superior iliac spine and the prominence of the greater trochanter.
• Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion (p. 217): In the depression of the midpoint between the anterosuperior iliac spine and the prominence of the great trochanter.

How is GB-29 Ju Liao needled, and what lies beneath it?

Stated plainly and with the anatomy given rather than a generic warning: GB-29 lies on the outer hip over the abductor muscles and the capsule of the hip joint. It is not over the sciatic nerve — that is Huan Tiao GB-30, behind and below it — and it is not over a body cavity or an organ. Sacred Lotus sources & references record perpendicular insertion of 0.5 to 1.0 inch, with moxibustion applicable, which is a moderate figure and markedly shallower than the 1.5 to 2.5 inches our records give for GB-30. Everything below is recorded as neutral reference data describing what the textbooks and the published anatomical studies document. It is not instruction, this page does not teach technique, and needling is carried out only by a qualified, licensed practitioner.

The angle and depth the texts record

• Sacred Lotus sources & references record perpendicular insertion of 0.5 to 1.0 inch, with moxibustion applicable.
• Deadman & Al-Khafaji (p. 446) and Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion (p. 217) record a comparable perpendicular range, with deeper insertion described where the tissue over the hip is thick.
• The comparison with GB-30 is the informative one. Queried directly, our own record for GB-30 gives 1.5 to 2.5 inches — roughly two and a half times the figure here. The reason is entirely anatomical: GB-30 is needled deep into the gluteal mass toward a nerve, and GB-29 is needled into a thinner muscle layer over a joint. Depth figures in this literature track what is underneath a point, not the importance of the point.
• Moxibustion is recorded as applicable and is common over the hip.

What actually lies beneath

• The tissue in order. At the midpoint of the line between the front pelvic bony point and the side of the thigh bone, a perpendicular needle passes through skin and subcutaneous fat, then the tensor fasciae latae and the gluteus medius, then gluteus minimus beneath it, and arrives at the capsule of the hip joint and the neck of the femur. Bone is the floor of this point.
• Gluteus medius is the structure that matters, and it can be measured. It is the principal hip abductor: the muscle that holds the pelvis level when the opposite foot leaves the ground. When it fails, the pelvis drops on the unsupported side and gait becomes unstable — which is exactly the presentation the one modern trial at this point set out to treat, using ultrasound to measure the muscle's thickness and contraction ratio directly beneath GB-29. That is described under research.
• The superior gluteal nerve and vessels run in the plane between gluteus medius and minimus, supplying the abductors. They are the named structures of this region. They are far smaller than the sciatic nerve and are not the subject of the case literature.
• The sciatic nerve is not beneath this point. It emerges from the greater sciatic foramen behind and below GB-29, under the piriformis muscle, and passes down the back of the thigh. The point that sits directly over it is Huan Tiao GB-30, and the safety facts about that relationship belong on the GB-30 record, where they are set out in full. Saying so is not a reassurance about technique; it is a statement about which point is which.

What has actually been measured — and on which point

The measured gluteal anatomy in the literature was carried out on GB-30 Huan Tiao and on the gluteal region generally. None of it measured GB-29. It is recorded here because GB-29 lies in the same region and a reader will meet these figures, and because measured anatomy is better reference than a vague warning — but the distinction must not be blurred, and no figure below is a measurement of this point. Our Huan Zhong record makes the same statement about the same studies from its own side.

• Sciatic nerve depth in the gluteal region, measured. An ultrasound study of 50 volunteers aged 18–45 measured sciatic nerve depth in the gluteal region and posterior thigh and built a prediction model from body measurements. The best single predictor was proximal thigh circumference, explaining 44.5 per cent of the variance; adding sex raised it to 49.7 per cent. The authors' stated purpose was to let clinicians estimate nerve depth in order to reduce the risk of accidental nerve injury during needle-based procedures (Minguez-Esteban I et al., J Clin Med 2024;13(24):7851, PMID 39768773). This measured the region and the nerve, not a named acupuncture point, and it is about the plane GB-30 occupies rather than GB-29's.
• Three-dimensional reconstruction — of GB-30. A Chinese study segmented the muscles, nerves and vessels around Huantiao GB-30 in a digitised human dataset and animated the insertion path through them, stating its objective as exploring the safety of needle insertion at that point (Zhongguo Zhen Jiu 2012;32(10):897–900, PMID 23259265). GB-29 was not modelled.
• No single agreed safe depth exists for any point. Two systematic reviews of the safe-depth literature — 33 studies in one, 47 in the other, by MRI, CT, ultrasound and cadaveric dissection — both concluded that measured depths for the same point differ greatly between subject groups and measuring methods, and that "safe depth" has never been standardised (J Altern Complement Med 2011;17(3):199–206, PMID 21417806; Evid Based Complement Alternat Med 2013;2013:740508, PMID 23935678).
• The one measurement made at GB-29 is of the muscle, not of a safe depth. The 2025 electroacupuncture trial described under research used ultrasound to measure gluteus medius thickness and contraction ratio directly at GB-29 in stroke patients (PMID 40390617). It establishes that the muscle beneath this point is measurable and that it changes; it does not report a needling depth.

What is documented, and in what proportion

A sudden electric-shock sensation during needling is not a normal needling sensation. A review traced the history of the recognised needling sensations, noted that the electric shock is included in some acupuncture sensation scales and excluded from others, and collated reported cases of acupuncture-related nerve injury in which the shock preceded the injury; its conclusion is that the shock is caused by the needle entering a nerve directly and should be treated as a warning sign of possible peripheral nerve injury rather than as a sign of correct technique (Guo Y et al., Neural Plast 2020;2020:8834573, PMID 33204248, PMC7655260). That is recorded here as a fact about needling near nerves generally; the leading example in this region is GB-30, not GB-29.

Risk in proportion. A meta-analysis of prospective clinical studies estimated serious adverse events at approximately 1 per 10,000 patients and about 8 per million treatments, with roughly half of all recorded events being bleeding, pain or flare at the needle site (Bäumler P et al., BMJ Open 2021;11:e045961, PMID 34489268). Systematic reviews of the Chinese case literature place the serious events over the chest, abdomen, neck and orbit, attributed chiefly to improper technique (He W et al., PMID 22967282). The hip is not among them, and no published case report naming GB-29 in connection with any injury was located. None is asserted.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (existing needling record and both location records; the GB-30 record queried directly for comparison); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 446; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 217; PMID 39768773 (gluteal region and sciatic nerve, not GB-29); PMID 23259265 (GB-30, not GB-29); PMID 40390617 (gluteus medius measured at GB-29); PMID 33204248 (PMC7655260); PMID 21417806; PMID 23935678; PMID 22967282; PMID 34489268 — each verified resolvable and checked for retraction status before citation.

What does the name Ju Liao mean?

Ju Liao at GB-29 means "Squatting Bone Hole" — ju, to squat, dwell or sit, and liao, a hole or crevice in bone. Sacred Lotus sources & references translate it exactly that way. The name is a location instruction of the practical kind: the depression the point occupies becomes apparent when the hip is flexed, so squatting or drawing the knee up is how the "bone hole" is found. Several hip and buttock points are named or located by the posture that reveals them — our GB-30 record notes that Huan Tiao's name is read the same way, as an instruction to curl up.

The character liao is not peculiar to the hip. It appears wherever a point is named for a hollow or depression in bone, and this library holds a dozen such points — among them BL-31 to BL-34, the four sacral liao points, SI-18 Quan Liao ("Cheek Bone Hole") and LI-12 Zhou Liao ("Elbow Bone Hole").

Is GB-29 the same as ST-03 Ju Liao?

No. This library holds two entirely different points whose pinyin is Ju Liao, and confusing them is easy because the romanisation is identical. Both were queried directly.

• GB-29 Ju Liao — "Squatting Bone Hole". On the hip, at the midpoint between the front bony point of the pelvis and the prominence of the thigh bone. Gall Bladder Channel of Foot Shao Yang. Classified as a Meeting Point of the Gall Bladder channel with the Yang Motility Vessel. Used for hip pain and leg weakness. This point.
• ST-03 Ju Liao — "Great Bone Hole". On the face, directly below the pupil with the eyes looking forward, level with the lower border of the nostril, at the outer side of the groove running from nose to mouth. Stomach Channel of Foot Yang Ming. Classified as a Meeting Point of the Stomach channel with the Yang Motility Vessel. Used for facial complaints — facial paralysis, twitching of the eyelid, toothache, swelling of the cheek and nosebleed.

The two names are written with different characters, which is why our own records translate one "Great" and the other "Squatting" — the second syllable, liao, is the same in both and simply means a bone hollow. So this is not one name applied to two places; it is two names that happen to sound alike in romanisation. The trap is real and worth naming: both points are classified in our own data as Meeting Points with the Yang Motility Vessel, so even the classification does not separate them at a glance. What separates them is the region — face or hip — and the channel.

This is the fifth such collision closed in this library's point programme. The others are Zi Gong (an extra point on the abdomen and a point on the Conception Vessel), Shen Que, Da Zhu and Fu Tu — in that last case two points on different channels whose pinyin differ only in tone. The general lesson each of them teaches is the same: a pinyin name alone never identifies a point in Chinese medicine. The channel and code together do. A search for "Ju Liao" that does not say which channel is meant is ambiguous, and any source that answers it without saying so should be read with care.

Why does it matter that GB-29 is a Yang Motility Vessel meeting point?

Meeting points are where two or more channels or vessels cross, and they are chosen when one needle should influence all of them. The Yang Qiao Mai — Yang Motility or Yang Heel Vessel — is one of the eight extraordinary vessels: it begins below the outer ankle, runs up the outer side of the leg and trunk to the shoulder and neck, and ends at the inner corner of the eye. Classically it governs the outer side of the body, the lifting and turning-out of the leg, and the balance between the two sides in standing and walking.

That last function is the one worth pausing on at GB-29, because the anatomy and the doctrine agree unusually well. The muscles directly beneath this point are the hip abductors, whose job is to keep the pelvis level when the body's weight is on one leg. A vessel said to govern side-to-side balance in standing crosses the Gall Bladder channel precisely where the muscles that produce that balance lie. Whether that is insight or coincidence is not something this page can settle — but it is the reason the one modern trial at this point chose it for post-stroke balance, and it is worth a reader knowing. Queried directly, Sacred Lotus sources & references hold thirteen points carrying a Yang Motility Vessel classification, among them Shen Mai BL-62, the vessel's Confluent Point, and Fu Yang BL-59, its Xi-Cleft point.

Is there research on GB-29 Ju Liao?

Yes — one genuinely point-specific randomised trial, which is more than most points of this rank can claim, plus one protocol trial that names it among several points. Both are set out with their limits.

• Electroacupuncture at GB-29 by name, with the muscle beneath it measured. Sixty-eight patients with hemiplegia after stroke were randomised to a control group receiving conventional acupuncture, standard medical treatment and rehabilitation training, or to an observation group receiving all of that plus electroacupuncture at Juliao GB-29 on the hemiplegic side, 30 minutes a session, once daily, five times a week for four weeks. Ultrasound measured gluteus medius thickness and contraction ratio before and after. Three findings: before treatment the gluteus medius contraction ratio and thickness were lower on the hemiplegic side than the sound side in both groups; the pre-treatment contraction ratio correlated positively with lower-limb Fugl-Meyer and Berg Balance scores; and after four weeks the observation group showed a greater gluteus medius contraction ratio and higher Fugl-Meyer and Berg Balance scores than the control group (P < 0.05), though muscle thickness did not differ significantly between groups. The authors concluded that electroacupuncture at GB-29 activates the gluteus medius on the affected side, providing a stability mechanism for the lumbo-pelvic-hip complex (Wu WK et al., Zhen Ci Yan Jiu 2025;50(5):592–598, PMID 40390617). The limits are real and should be stated: 68 patients at a single centre with dropouts and withdrawals in both arms; no sham arm, so the comparison is added treatment against no added treatment and cannot separate the point from the extra attention and stimulation; unblinded outcome assessment on rating scales; and four weeks of follow-up in a condition where spontaneous recovery is ongoing. What makes it worth recording nonetheless is that it is about this point, that its outcome measure is an ultrasound measurement of the specific muscle beneath the point rather than a global impression, and that the muscle it chose is the anatomically correct one.
• A protocol trial naming GB-29 among several points. One hundred patients with piriformis syndrome were randomised to routine acupuncture — at Huan Tiao GB-30, Juliao GB-29, Zhi Bian BL-54, Wei Zhong BL-40, Yang Ling Quan GB-34, Xuan Zhong GB-39 and ashi points — or to an elongated-needle hui-puncture method applied at GB-30 and ashi points only. Both groups improved on symptom and visual analogue pain scores; the elongated-needle group improved more, with effective rates of 94 per cent against 78 per cent (Li SS, Wu YC, Zhen Ci Yan Jiu 2020;45(7):583–586, PMID 32705835). Note carefully what this does and does not say about GB-29: the point was in the arm that did worse, and the intervention that did better did not use it at all. It is cited to show that GB-29 is a standard component of published hip-pain protocols, not as evidence of its effect. Every point in both arms is held in this library and each was queried.
• What is not here. There is no sham-controlled trial of GB-29, no trial of it for hip osteoarthritis or any of its classical indications, and no imaging or cadaveric measurement of needling depth at this point. Its standing rests on the classical record, on its position over the hip abductors, and on the single small trial above.

A point-code caution, recorded because it was met while assembling this. Searching the pinyin "Juliao" returns a small readable set — but a substantial part of it concerns ST-03 Ju Liao on the face, appearing in papers on oculomotor nerve palsy, facial paralysis and orthodontic pain, which have nothing to do with the hip. Searching the code "GB 29" without qualification returns over a hundred records in which the string is mostly incidental. Every record considered for this page was read rather than counted, and each was checked for which of the two Ju Liao points it actually meant.

How does Ju Liao differ from the points near it?

Huan Tiao GB-30 is the point GB-29 is most often confused with and the more important of the two: it lies behind and below on the postero-lateral hip, over the deep gluteal muscles and the sciatic nerve, is recorded at roughly two and a half times GB-29's needling depth, and is the tradition's great point for pain radiating down the leg. Both are held here. Feng Shi GB-31 lies below on the outer thigh, and Yang Ling Quan GB-34 below the outer knee as the Hui-Meeting Point of the Sinews. Zhi Bian BL-54 and Cheng Fu BL-36 are the Bladder-channel points on the buttock. Bi Guan ST-31 is the Stomach-channel point at the front of the hip. The extra point Huan Zhong, held here, lies midway between GB-30 and Yao Shu DU-02 on the buttock. And ST-03 Ju Liao, as set out above, shares this point's pinyin while being on the face — the collision this record exists in part to close. All of these are held in this library and all were queried.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (name, translation, channel, the Meeting Point classification, the complete set of points carrying a Yang Motility Vessel classification, and the ST-03, BL-31, BL-32, BL-33, BL-34, BL-36, BL-40, BL-54, BL-59, BL-62, SI-18, LI-12, ST-31, GB-30, GB-31, GB-34, GB-39 and Huan Zhong records queried directly); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 446; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 217; PMID 40390617; PMID 32705835 — each verified resolvable and checked for retraction status before citation; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.