RESUMEN
Objective To observe the clinical efficacy of the combined therapy of super-laser radiation and plum acupuncture on alopecia areata.Methods Altogether 178 alopecia areata patients were randomly divided into 3 groups:65 patients in the treatment group being given super-laser radiation and plum acupuncture,55 in the control group A solely with super-laser radiation and 58 in the control group B solely with plum acupuncture.The therapeutic effects of the treatment group and the control groups were compared by rank sum test.Results At the end of the 1st treating period,the cured cases,markedly effective cases,ordinary effective cases and invalid cases in control group A were 1,4,10 and 40;those numbers of control group B were 1,3,11 and 43;those numbers of the treatment group were 3,12,14 and 36.At the end of the 2nd treating period,those numbers of control group A were 8,8,16 and 23;those numbers of control group B were 7,8,18 and 25;those numbers of the treatment group were 11,20,19 and 15.At the end of the 3rd treating period,those numbers of A control group were 21,11,12 and 11;those numbers of B control group were 20,14,11 and 13;those numbers of the treatment group were 33,17,10 and 5.Comparing the performance of each groups at the end of the 3 periods,we found that effects were always better in the treatment group than the other two control groups.The difference between the treatment group and the other two control groups was statistically significant (P＜0.05).Conclusions It is effective and safe to use super laser radiation combined plum acupuncture on alopecia areata.The clinical efficacy of this joint method is better than either of the two separate ways.