Acupuncture for treating temporomandibular disorder: retrospective study on safety and efficacy.

This study aimed to retrospectively examine the efficacy and safety of acupuncture for the relief of pain originating from temporomandibular joint disorder and trigeminal neuralgia. Participants included patients suffering from trigeminal neuralgia or temporomandibular disorder with osseous pathology ruled out by panoramic X-rays. Participants received a series of 8-10 weekly acupuncture treatments and rated their pain via a visual analogue scale. From assessment of a total of 39 patients, analysis of pain severity before and after treatment showed that acupuncture intervention was highly beneficial for patients with temporomandibular joint disorder (88.6%, p < 0.01), compared with patients with trigeminal neuralgia in which there was only a minor effect (25%). The data also demonstrated that acupuncture was both efficacious in acute patients (91%, p < 0.01) and chronic patients (70%, p < 0.05) and elicited no side effects during the course of treatment. Acupuncture treatment was a safe and efficient methodology for relieving the pain of patients suffering from temporomandibular disorder with no detectable osseous joint component. Based on these results, a randomized clinical trial is being initiated at the Stomatologic Clinic at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center to assess the role of acupuncture in treating temporomandibular joint disorder.

Large-volume breast reduction: Long-term results.

Forty-three women had reduction mammaplasty during the period 1992-2000 and the cosmetic outcome was evaluated using subjective and objective measures. The inferior pedicle technique was used in all cases. The mean (SD) weight of resected tissue was 1121 (415) g. All objective measurements were within the ideal range except for breast volume and nipple-to-inframammary-line distance, which were more than ideal. Overall, the median difference in measurements between the two breasts of each woman was less than 10%. However, the subjective evaluations given by both clinicians and the patients for overall symmetry and for general aesthetic appearance fell below the preset threshold. The shape of the breast correlated best with the grades of symmetry and general appearance. There was no correlation between the objective and subjective evaluations of symmetry. The disappointing subjective scores, which may be attributed to the specific characteristics of our sample group, are heavy breasts and overweight patients, a double team approach, and the inevitable pseudoptosis that develops with the inferior pedicle approach. These direct us to recommend searching for an alternative operative technique and to evaluate its long term results, as well as placing the nipple-areola complex lower than the standard inframammary fold projection.

[Acupuncture as complementary medicine in patients with osteoarthritis of the knee].

The popularity of integrative medicine, mainstream medical therapies combined with complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), increased in recent years in the USA and western countries. However, evidence based data on the efficacy of integrative medicine and safety is incomplete. Until recently, research on the use of acupuncture in osteoarthritis had methodological limitations such as low sample size. Recently, two large phase III randomized clinical studies were published on the efficacy of acupuncture in osteoarthritis of the knee. The studies have shown that acupuncture serves as an effective complementary treatment to standard care, improves function and provides pain relief for people with osteoarthritis of the knee. These studies confirm the results of previous studies on acupuncture as effective complementary treatment to standard care. This review summarizes the results of randomized clinical trials of acupuncture for treatment of osteoarthritis of the knee.