Acupuncture in medicine : journal of the British Medical Acupuncture Society
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Review
Is it all about sex? Acupuncture for the treatment of pain from a biological and gender perspective.
Pain is a unique personal experience showing variability where gender and sex related effects might contribute. The mechanisms underlying the differences between women and men are currently unknown but are likely to be complex and involving interactions between biological, sociocultural and psychological aspects. In women, painful experimental stimuli are generally reported to produce a greater intensity of pain than in men. ⋯ When assessing the outcome of pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapies in pain treatment, the factors of gender and sex should be taken into account as the response to an intervention may differ. Preferably, treatment recommendations should be based on studies using both women and men as the norm. Due to variability in results, findings from animal studies and experiments in healthy subjects should be interpreted with care.
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Controlled Clinical Trial
Surface electrostimulation of acupuncture points for sedation of critically ill patients in the intensive care unit--a pilot study.
This is a pilot study to investigate the effects of electrostimulation of acupuncture points on sedation and the dose of sedatives in the Intensive Care Unit. ⋯ This pilot study showed significant reduction in the dose of propofol required for sedation in critically ill patients following surface electrostimulation of acupuncture points, without any adverse effects. A randomised controlled trial is warranted.
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Good clinical evidence has been reported for the effect of PC6 acupuncture in preventing or attenuating postoperative and pregnancy related nausea. Our primary aim was to examine whether PC6 acupuncture during a period of chemotherapy could complement pharmacological treatment of nausea in cancer patients in the palliative stage of their disease. ⋯ The study demonstrated that acupuncture treatment in cancer patients can be associated with a significantly reduced intensity of nausea during a period of chemotherapy in their final phase of life.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Acupuncture needling versus lidocaine injection of trigger points in myofascial pain syndrome in elderly patients--a randomised trial.
To compare the efficacy of acupuncture needling and 0.5% lidocaine injection of trigger points in myofascial pain syndrome of elderly patients. ⋯ There was no significant difference between acupuncture needling and 0.5% lidocaine injection of trigger points for treating myofascial pain syndrome in elderly patients.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study Controlled Clinical Trial
Point injection as an alternative acupuncture technique--an exploratory study of responses in healthy subjects.
Point injection as a therapeutic technique is well documented, but its physiological effects have not been formally compared with traditional acupuncture. One aim of this study was to compare the effects of the two techniques at one acupuncture point, as a step towards understanding the mode of action of point injection and validating its clinical use. A second aim was to explore whether repeated point injection at the same site might provide a way of increasing the dose of stimulation, in the hope of identifying a dose response curve which could be an alternative strategy to placebo control in demonstrating the biological effects of acupuncture. ⋯ Point injection and traditional acupuncture seem to provoke similar physiological responses, although the greater needle sensation seen with point injection might indicate it could have more powerful clinical effects. Further studies of repeated point injection are necessary to indicate whether this technique may provide a method of increased strength of point stimulation, as an alternative to traditional needling in acupuncture research.