Ever since acupuncture gained popularity in the United States and Europe, there have been countless studies as to its effectiveness (or lack thereof) for treating everything from common aches to cancer. Studies have been performed with various methods and the results have been just as varied. I've spent weeks trying to find articles, but for each I find, there’s another that has results counter to the first. In order to retain any semblance of sanity searching for an unbiased view, I've turned to examining a few meta-analyses instead.
The biggest collection of literature and research is acupuncture for various pain treatments. One of the most cited and largest studies was done by Vickers et al. (2012), which looks into the effectiveness of using acupuncture for chronic pain conditions (specifically back and neck pain, osteoarthritis, chronic headache, and shoulder pain). The meta-analysis was conducted on 29 different randomized controlled trials consisting of 17,922 patients. In all trials, acupuncture showed significantly greater effectiveness over sham acupuncture and other types of controls (though it was noted that sham acupuncture had some effectiveness over no acupuncture -- something to explore on another day). All pain conditions were equally affected.
Madsen, Gøtzsche, Hróbjartsson (2009) conducted a meta-analysis with 13 trials, and though they found some evidence of acupuncture having a "small analgesic effect," they found the data regarding the effectiveness of sham acupuncture (used as a control in many of the trials) to be troublesome. In some of the trials they found sham acupuncture to be greatly effective and in other trials, not effective at all. This brings doubt onto the traditional foundational knowledge behind acupuncture and whether the effect is more physiological or psychological.
A 2014 study conducted by Manyanga, et al. compared traditional acupuncture to sham acupuncture, no treatment, and usual care in a meta-analysis of 12 trials (1763 participants). They found that, though acupuncture seemed to be effective, its effects varied widely between trials. The duration of the effectiveness and magnitude of the effects were not consistent between trials.
Another area that acupuncture has had some success is for smoking cessation. White, Resch, and Ernst (1999) found that while acupuncture was successful for smoking cessation over wait-list controls, it was not superior to sham acupuncture and though various techniques were tried in all the trials, no particular technique was superior. The study made mention that the effects were non-specific and it’s possible they could be related more to motivation than a physiological effect of the acupuncture.
Though most of these studies found that acupuncture was effective, they also found inconsistencies and a curious correlation between sham treatments and effectiveness. I've decided that I'll look further into this link next week.
Works Cited
Madsen, M. V., Gøtzsche, P. C., & Hróbjartsson, A. (2009). Acupuncture treatment for pain: systematic review of randomised clinical trials with acupuncture, placebo acupuncture, and no acupuncture groups. BMJ, 338.
Manyanga, T., Froese, M., Zarychanski, R., Abou-Setta, A., Friesen, C., Tennenhouse, M., & Shay, B. L. (2014). Pain management with acupuncture in osteoarthritis: a systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine, 14. doi:10.1186/1472-6882-14-312
Vickers, A. J., Cronin, A. M., Maschino, A. C., Lewith, G., MacPherson, H., Foster, N. E., Linde, K. (2012). Acupuncture for Chronic Pain: Individual Patient Data Meta-analysis. Arch Intern Med, 172(19), 1444-53. doi:10.1001/archinternmed.2012.3654
White, A. R., Resch, K.-L., & Ernst, E. (1999). A meta-analysis of acupuncture techniques for smoking cessation. Tob Control, 8(4), 393--7. doi:10.1136/tc.8.4.393
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