All these people saying that dry needling is acupuncture are extremely misinformed. If they have a license in acupuncture they should be smart enough to know the difference between the two. Dry needling is extremely helpful to people in pain. Acupuncture only goes skin deep, dry needling goes deep into the muscle to help relieve tightness, pain, knots, etc. 

If dry needling were the same as acupuncture, people would go to some Chinese medicine doctor to get it done. But it's not. So they don't. 

And YES! You do have to be certified in dry needling to perform it. Does nobody realize that PTs have to have a doctorate?!? That's 7 years of college!!  So stop saying that they don't have enough "practice" or "education".