LI-11 (Qu Chi) Pool at the Bend

What does LI-11 Qu Chi do?

LI-11 Qu Chi is the He-Sea and Earth point of the Large Intestine channel of Hand Yang Ming, and the tradition's principal point for clearing heat. Because the Large Intestine is a yang Metal channel, its He-Sea point falls on Earth, the generating (mother) element — which is the technical basis for using it both to drain excess heat and to strengthen the channel. It is additionally recorded as one of Sun Si-miao's Ghost points and one of Ma Dan-yang's Heavenly Star points.

• Clears heat — its defining action, applied to exterior heat, interior heat and Yang Ming heat alike.
• Cools the blood, eliminates wind, drains damp and alleviates itching — the combination that makes it the standard point for skin disease in Chinese medicine.
• Regulates qi and blood — the He-Sea point's general harmonising role on the channel.
• Activates the channel and alleviates pain — its local and channel action at the elbow and along the arm.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (channel, five-shu and special-point classifications); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 112; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 142.

What is LI-11 Qu Chi used for?

LI-11 is used chiefly for heat patterns, skin disease and disorders of the upper limb. The indications recorded in our sources divide into heat and febrile conditions, itching and eruptive skin complaints, head-and-throat disorders along the Yang Ming channel, and local elbow and arm problems.

• Febrile disease and generalised fever
• Sore throat
• Toothache
• Redness, swelling and pain of the eye
• Urticaria and other itching eruptions
• Scrofula (chronic neck nodules)
• Motor impairment of the upper extremities
• Pain, swelling or restricted movement of the elbow
• Abdominal pain
• Vomiting
• Diarrhoea

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 142; Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 112; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.

How is LI-11 Qu Chi used in practice?

LI-11 is found at the elbow with the arm bent: at the outer end of the elbow crease, halfway between LU-05 Chi Ze in the middle of the crease and the bony prominence on the outer side of the upper arm bone. The flexed elbow forms the "pool" the name refers to, and the point is one of the most reliably located on the body.

• With LI-04 He Gu — the standard Yang Ming pairing for clearing heat and releasing the exterior; the Source point below and the He-Sea point above on the same channel.
• With SP-10 Xue Hai — the classic combination for itching, rashes and blood heat, adding a blood-cooling point to a heat-clearing one.
• With DU-14, the meeting point of the yang channels on the upper back — a common pairing for high fever and exterior heat.
• With LI-15 Jian Yu and LI-04 He Gu — the standard channel treatment for weakness or motor impairment of the arm, working the Yang Ming channel along its length.
• With LIV-03 Tai Chong — used where heat is accompanied by ascendant Liver yang, joining the arm's heat-clearing point to the foot's Source point.

Among the He-Sea points, LI-11 is the one most consistently reached for when the presenting problem is heat rather than a fu-organ disorder — a role it shares with, but exercises more prominently than, ST-36 or SI-08. Its pairing with SP-10 is the point combination most associated with dermatological practice in modern Chinese medicine, and LI-11 appears in the great majority of published acupuncture protocols for urticaria and eczema.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references (location and point categories); Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 112; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 142; cross-referenced against multiple online sources.

Where is LI-11 located?

• A Manual of Acupuncture (p. 112): At the elbow, midway between Chize LU-5 and the lateral epicondyle of the humerus, at the lateral end of the transverse cubital crease.
• Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion (p. 142): When the elbow is flexed, the point is in the depression at the lateral end of the transverse cubital crease, midway between Chize (LU-5) and the lateral epicondyle of the humerus.

How is LI-11 Qu Chi needled in the textbooks?

Reference record only — this describes what the standard texts document, not instruction for a reader. Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion records perpendicular insertion of 1.0–1.5 cun at LI-11, with moxibustion noted as applicable. Deadman & Al-Khafaji record a comparable perpendicular range and additionally describe oblique insertion directed toward LU-05 for elbow disorders and toward the hand for channel problems of the forearm.

• Angle documented: perpendicular; oblique variants toward LU-05 or distally along the channel.
• Depth documented: approximately 1.0–1.5 cun.
• Moxibustion: documented as applicable.
• Position: the texts specify that the point is located and needled with the elbow flexed, since the landmark crease appears only in flexion.

Safety reference. LI-11 lies over muscle at the lateral elbow and carries no cavity, organ or major-vessel hazard; it is one of the safer points on the body and is often used in teaching for that reason. The radial nerve passes deep and lateral in the region, so deep or laterally angled needling is documented as capable of producing a strong radiating sensation down the forearm. Standard clean-needle practice applies. Acupuncture is performed by qualified practitioners; this record documents the literature and is not a technique guide.

Source: Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 142; Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 112; Sacred Lotus sources & references.

What does the name Qu Chi mean?

Qu Chi translates as "Pool at the Bend" — qu meaning bend or crook, chi meaning pool. The name is descriptive: when the elbow is flexed, a hollow appears at the outer end of the crease, and the channel qi is imagined gathering there as water gathers in a pool. The imagery is also five-shu imagery — He-Sea points are the place where the qi of a channel is said to enter the deep, so a water name at a He-Sea point is deliberate.

Why does the He-Sea classification matter at LI-11?

The Large Intestine is a yang Metal channel, so its He-Sea point falls on Earth — and Earth generates Metal. In the five-element scheme that makes LI-11 the tonification (mother) point of its own channel, giving it a supplementing role alongside its far better-known draining one. This is the reason the tradition can use one point both to clear a strong fever and to strengthen a weak arm, and it explains why LI-11 appears in protocols for chronic depletion-type skin disease as well as acute heat.

Is there research on LI-11?

Point-specific research on LI-11 is limited, and most of the clinical literature that involves it studies whole multi-point protocols rather than the point alone — a distinction worth keeping. In its main traditional territory, a systematic review of acupuncture for chronic urticaria included 6 trials and 406 participants and reported improvement in global symptoms against drug comparators, while noting a high overall risk of bias, that all included trials were Chinese-language, and that the level of evidence was low (PMID 27314024). A more recent systematic review and meta-analysis of acupuncture for atopic dermatitis pooled 8 trials and 463 participants and reported improvement in SCORAD and pruritus scores meeting minimal clinically important thresholds, but no significant difference in EASI or serum IgE, again with limited study quality (PMID 39638592). LI-11 features in the protocols of both reviews but neither isolates it.

Genuinely point-specific work is mostly mechanistic. A functional imaging study examined brain activity changes produced by needling LI-11 in healthy individuals (PMID 39397172), and an animal study of pre-treatment at LI-11 with SP-10 reported effects on mast cells and IL-33/ST2 signalling in a rat urticaria model (PMID 37186193) — animal mechanism work, not clinical evidence. On blood pressure, LI-11 appears in many hypertension protocols and there is a small Chinese randomised trial of needling LI-11 with LIV-03 reporting changes in endothelin and angiotensin-converting enzyme levels (PMID 15658649), but a Chinese-language review of the field concluded that the acupuncture-for-hypertension literature as a whole suffers from serious methodological problems (PMID 29701056). There is no robust point-specific evidence that LI-11 alone lowers blood pressure, and the site does not claim otherwise.

How does LI-11 differ from nearby points?

LI-11 is commonly confused with LU-05 Chi Ze, which sits in the middle of the same elbow crease on the Lung channel and is a Water He-Sea point used for Lung heat and phlegm rather than for skin and general heat. Just distal to it, LI-10 Shou San Li ("Arm Three Li") shares a naming pattern with ST-36 Zu San Li but is a different point on a different channel, used mainly for arm pain and Yang Ming digestive complaints. Where LI-11 clears heat broadly, LI-04 He Gu below it releases the exterior and moves qi, and the two are more often used together than apart.

Source: Sacred Lotus sources & references; Deadman & Al-Khafaji, A Manual of Acupuncture, p. 112; Chinese Acupuncture & Moxibustion, p. 142; PubMed PMID 27314024, 39638592, 39397172, 37186193, 15658649, 29701056 (each checked for retraction status before citation).