Journal Club
2013
Forschende Komplementärmedizin
The efficacy as well as the effectiveness of acupuncture in the treatment of chronic pain diseases in musculoskeletal system and head was one of the main focuses of CAM research in the years between 1998 and 2008. With these trials, the study methodology in the research field of acupuncture increased markedly, and therefore some of the work has been published in high-ranked journals like Lancet, Journal of the American Medical Association, British Medical Journal, and Annals and Archives of
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... rnal Medicine. The studies were supported by 3 main funding sources, the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) in the USA, public and private funding in the UK, and German health insurance companies. The trials provide convincing evidence that acupuncture is efficacious and safe in the treatment of the pain diseases mentioned above. On the one hand it causes additional costs, but on the other hand acupuncture treatment is all in all cost-effective. It is known that in chronic pain diseases of the musculoskeletal system and head the overall treatment effect is high, with response rates of about 50%, and comparable to other pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment strategies -sometimes even better. Therefore, acupuncture is more and more accepted by conventional medics, although its treatment specificity is much discussed. In the last 5 years, the effect of acupuncture in functional pain and non-pain diseases such as irritable bowel syndrome, depression, and allergy is increasingly becoming a focus of research interest. Following the results of these studies, there seems to be convincing evidence that acupuncture is also a successful treatment in non-pain diseases. In this Journal Club, the methodology and the results of 3 exciting new acupuncture studies are discussed by CAM and non-CAM experts. I gratefully thank all experts for their high-quality comments and wish you pleasant reading.
doi:10.1159/000357762
fatcat:yfcimuu3h5bj5gnek2boncauka