Effect of acupuncture on pain-emotion related brain regions in patients with cervical spondylosis of cervical type: a fMRI study / 中国针灸

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE@#To observe the changes of functional connectivity of brain pain-emotion regulation region in patients with cervical spondylosis of cervical type by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).@*METHODS@#Thirty-two subjects were selected. Of them, 16 patients with cervical spondylosis of cervical type were divided into an observation group and 16 healthy subjects into a control group. The patients in the observation group were treated with acupuncture at Tianzhu (BL 10), Jingbailao (EX-HN 15), Jianzhongshu (SI 15) and @*RESULTS@#In the observation group, the VAS score was (1.94±1.12) after the treatment, which was lower than (5.62±1.20) before treatment (@*CONCLUSION@#Pain involves the formation and expression of "pain-emotion-cognition". Acupuncture can systematically regulate the brain functional connections between cognitive regions such as dorsal prefrontal lobe and anterior cingulate gyrus and emotional regions such as insula and VTA in patients with cervical spondylosis of cervical type, suggesting that acupuncture has a multi-dimensional and comprehensive regulation effect on pain.