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- Title
2016 - In chronic severe functional constipation, electroacupuncture increased complete spontaneous bowel movements.
- Authors
Chakraborty, Subhankar; Bharucha, Adil E.
- Abstract
Question In chronic severe functional constipation, does electroacupuncture (EA) improve outcomes? Methods Design Randomized sham-controlled trial. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01726504. Allocation Concealed.* Blinding Blinded* (patients, outcome assessors, and statisticians). Follow-up period 20 weeks (8-wk treatment and 12-wk follow-up). Setting 15 centers in China. Patients 1075 patients 18 to 75 years of age (mean age 47 y, 76% women) who had functional constipation (Rome III diagnostic criteria), < 2 mean complete spontaneous bowel movements (CSBMs) per week for > 3 months, no previous acupuncture for constipation, and no use of medication for constipation in the past 2 weeks except for rescue medication. Exclusion criteria included constipation secondary to other diseases, other serious diseases or conditions, blood coagulation disorders, regular use of anticoagulants, or cardiac pacemaker implantation. Intervention EA (acupuncture that included an electric current between needles) at traditional acupoints (n = 536) or sham EA (SA) using shallow needling at nonacupoints (n = 539). Both groups received 28 sessions over 8 weeks. Outcomes Primary outcome was change in CSBMs during treatment. Other outcomes included change in CSBMs during follow-up, patients with > 3 CSBMs/wk, SBM stool consistency (Bristol Stool Form Scale) and need for straining during treatment, quality of life (Patient Assessment of Constipation Quality of Life questionnaire), and adverse events. Patient follow-up 95% (intention-to-treat analysis). Main results The main results are in the Table. EA and SA did not differ for acupuncture-related adverse events over 20 weeks (5.8% vs 4.5%, P = 0.32). Conclusion In chronic severe functional constipation, electroacupuncture increased complete spontaneous bowel movements compared with sham electroacupuncture.
- Subjects
CHINA; CHRONIC disease treatment; THERAPEUTICS; LAXATIVES; CONFIDENCE intervals; CONSTIPATION; DEFECATION; ELECTROACUPUNCTURE; FECES; LONGITUDINAL method; MEDICAL cooperation; QUALITY of life; QUESTIONNAIRES; RESEARCH; RANDOMIZED controlled trials; TREATMENT effectiveness; SEVERITY of illness index; DESCRIPTIVE statistics
- Publication
ACP Journal Club, 2016, Vol 165, Issue 12, p1
- ISSN
1056-8751
- Publication type
Article