• Any gender

• 14-17 (Adolescents) and 18-80 (Adults) years old

• Right-handed

• Either outpatient or inpatient or status changing between each other

• Have been diagnosed with SCD (includes but not limited to SS, SC or other type) and experiencing chronic pain in the past 6 months or vaso-occlusive crisis (VOC) in the past 12 months.

• Analgesic therapy prescribed by primary hematologists (or physicians for emergency or primary care) including pain-relieving medications (e.g. Morphine, coderin, Fentanyl, Oxycodone), Hydroxyurea (e.g. Droxia, Hydrea, Siklos), L-glutamine oral powder (Endari), Crizanlizumab (Adakveo), Voxelotor (Oxbryta), and/or other palliative treatment allowed, not required.

• Willing to limit the current and the introduction of any new medications or treatment modalities for control of pain symptoms during the study visits.

• Able to travel to the study site for participating scheduled visits (questionnaires, QST, EEG and MRI) and receive acupuncture treatments up to two times weekly for 5 weeks as scheduled.

• We will recruit without regard to ethnicity, however, due to the genetic nature of SCD, subjects will primarily be African-American or of African descent, although there are individuals with SCD who come from Hispanic, southern European, Middle Eastern, or Asian Indian backgrounds. The ethnic distribution in our prior studies is 95% Black/African American with 5% Hispanic or Latino (of any race). As these are minority groups many individuals may be from lower income situations.

• Fluent in English and capable of giving written informed consent.