Identifying patients with chronic pain who respond to acupuncture: results from an individual patient data meta-analysis

Author:

Foster Nadine E1,Vertosick Emily A2,Lewith George3,Linde Klaus4,MacPherson Hugh5,Sherman Karen J6,Witt Claudia M78,Vickers Andrew J2,

Affiliation:

1. Primary Care Centre Versus Arthritis, School of Primary, Community and Social Care, Keele University, Staffordshire, UK

2. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, NY, USA

3. Faculty of Medicine, Primary Care and Population Sciences, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK

4. Institute of General Practice, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany

5. Department of Health Sciences, University of York, York, UK

6. Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, Seattle, WA, USA

7. Institute for Complementary and Integrative Medicine, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland

8. Institute for Social Medicine, Epidemiology and Health Economics, Charité—Universitätsmedizin, Berlin, Germany

Abstract

Background In a recent individual patient data meta-analysis, acupuncture was found to be superior to sham and non-sham controls in patients with chronic pain. It has been suggested that a subgroup of patients has an exceptional response to acupuncture. We hypothesized the presence of exceptional acupuncture responders would lead to a different distribution of pain scores in acupuncture versus control groups, with the former being skewed to the right. Methods This individual patient data meta-analysis included 39 high-quality randomized trials of acupuncture for chronic headache, migraine, osteoarthritis, low back pain, neck pain and shoulder pain published before December 2015 (n = 20,827). In all, 25 involved sham acupuncture controls (n = 7097) and 25 non-acupuncture controls (n = 16,041). We analyzed the distribution of change scores and calculated the difference in the skewness statistic—which assesses asymmetry in the data distribution—between acupuncture and either sham or non-acupuncture control groups. We then entered the difference in skewness along with standard error into a meta-analysis. Findings Control groups were more right-skewed than acupuncture groups, although this difference was very small. The difference in skew was 0.124 for non-acupuncture-controlled trials (p = 0.047) and 0.141 for sham-controlled trials (p = 0.029). In a pre-specified sensitivity analysis excluding three trials with outlying results known a priori, the difference in skew between acupuncture and sham was no longer statistically significant (p = 0.2). Conclusion We did not find evidence to support the notion that there are exceptional acupuncture responders. The challenge remains to identify features of chronic pain patients that can be used to distinguish those that have a good response to acupuncture treatment.

Funder

National Institute for Health Research

Samueli Institute

National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Publisher

SAGE Publications

Subject

Neurology (clinical),Complementary and alternative medicine,General Medicine

同舟云学术

1.学者识别学者识别

2.学术分析学术分析

3.人才评估人才评估

"同舟云学术"是以全球学者为主线,采集、加工和组织学术论文而形成的新型学术文献查询和分析系统,可以对全球学者进行文献检索和人才价值评估。用户可以通过关注某些学科领域的顶尖人物而持续追踪该领域的学科进展和研究前沿。经过近期的数据扩容,当前同舟云学术共收录了国内外主流学术期刊6万余种,收集的期刊论文及会议论文总量共计约1.5亿篇,并以每天添加12000余篇中外论文的速度递增。我们也可以为用户提供个性化、定制化的学者数据。欢迎来电咨询!咨询电话:010-8811{复制后删除}0370

www.globalauthorid.com

TOP

Copyright © 2019-2024 北京同舟云网络信息技术有限公司
京公网安备11010802033243号  京ICP备18003416号-3