Osteoarthritis most commonly affects the knees. Anti-inflammatory drugs used in the treatment of the disease have many known side effects. In addition, patients using these drugs do not get the desired improvement and surgery is often recommended. Patients with chronic pain are increasingly turning to acupuncture as they turn to non-drug treatments to relieve pain. A randomized controlled trial was conducted to show whether acupuncture is effective in osteoarthritic knee pain.
In the study, which was conducted with 294 patients selected between the ages of 50 and 75, the participants were divided into 3 groups. Each group was controlled both before and after treatment and at 8, 26, and 52 weeks after treatment. Real acupuncture was applied to the first of these 3 groups of patients. While the 2nd group was given a sham acupuncture called minimal acupuncture, the 3rd group was treated with 12 sessions of acupuncture starting from the 9th week, while no action was taken for the first 8 weeks. The first 2 groups received acupuncture treatment consisting of 12 sessions for 8 weeks.
When these patient groups were compared, the pain scores of the group that received acupuncture treatment after the treatment and at the following 8th week were statistically significantly lower than the other two groups. When the 1st and 8th weeks were compared, a significant decrease was observed in the acupuncture treatment group compared to the others in the amount of medication the patients took and the number of pain medications taken weekly. In the 3rd group, which was not treated at the beginning, after the 9th week of treatment, the same improvements were observed as in the first group. After the 26th week, it was observed that the treatment effects decreased and there was no difference between the groups.
As a result: It was observed that acupuncture treatment caused a decrease in knee pain due to calcification. Considering the very serious side effects of the drugs used in the treatment of this disease and the inability to achieve the desired result in the treatment, acupuncture can be used as a safe treatment method for knee pain with very low side effects.
To access the article:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16005336/
