Effectivenss of electroacupuncture for skeletal muscle pain in Parkinson's disease: a Clinical randomized controlled trial.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the effect of electroacupuncture on skeletal muscle pain in Parkinson's disease (PD). METHODS: A single-center randomized controlled trial was conducted with sixty patients with Parkinson's disease with skeletal muscle pain were randomly divided into electroacupuncture group and sham acupuncture control group with 30 patients each. The electric acupuncture group was treated with electric acupuncture, while the control group was treated with Park needle pseudoacupuncture. Both groups were treated 5 times a week for a total of 4 weeks, and both groups completed 20 treatments. King's Parkinson's Pain Scale (KPPS) and visual analog scale (VAS) were used before and after treatment to evaluate the pain degree of patients. Real-time shear wave elastography (SWE) and modified Ashworth score (MAS) were used to evaluate the changes of muscle tone. Parkinson's comprehensive Score Scale (MDS-UPDRS, including UPDRSⅡ and UPDRS Ⅲ) was used to evaluate exercise ability. Hamilton Depression Scale (HAMD) score was used to evaluate the emotional changes of patients. Spearman correlation analysis was used to explore the correlation between pain degree and muscle tone, exercise ability and emotion. RESULTS: During the study, one case fell off in the control group, and 30 cases were eventually included in the analysis and treatment group and 29 cases in the control group. After treatment, Young's modulus of biceps and quadriceps and shear wave velocity of biceps were decreased in electroacupuncture group compared with before treatment, while KPPS score, VAS score, UPDRSⅡ, UPDRS Ⅲ and modified Ashworth score were decreased, with statistical significance (P < 0.05). There was no statistical significance in control group (P > 0.05). After treatment, KPPS score, VAS score, UPDRSⅡ and UPDRS Ⅲ, MAS, HAMD score, Young's modulus of biceps and shear wave velocity in electroacupuncture group were significantly lower than those in control group (P < 0.05). Spearman correlation analysis showed that KPPS score was positively correlated with UPDRS Ⅲ (r = 0.414, P < 0.05). KPPS score was positively correlated with HAMD score (r = 0.576, P < 0.01). CONCLUSION: Electroacupuncture therapy can effectively improve skeletal muscle pain in patients with Parkinson's disease, reduce the muscle hardness of patients, improve patients' daily life ability, and improve patients' emotional disorders. The degree of skeletal muscle pain in PD patients is correlated with motor ability and emotional disorders, but there is no significant correlation between the degree of skeletal muscle pain and the muscle tone of PD patients.

Effect of acupuncture treatment on nonketotic hyperglycemic hemichorea-hemiballismus: a case report.

Nonketotic hyperglycemic hemichorea-hemiballismus is a rare syndrome in the clinic, and treatment is often delayed. Hypoglycemic therapy is the most widely used and effective treatment, but some patients experience a slower improvement. Other symptomatic treatment medicines have some degree of side effects. Acupuncture treatment is beneficial for hemichorea-hemiballismus. A male patient, aged 59 years, first visited our hospital outpatient department due to motor agitation with involuntary movements of the right limb. He had a history of type 2 diabetes mellitus and poor blood glucose control. His serum glucose was 26.5 mmol/L (normal: 4.4-6.1 mmol/L), and magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated an irregular area of high signal intensity in T1-weighted imaging, low signal intensity on T2-weighted imaging, and high signal intensity in the left corpus striatum in T2-FLAIR imaging. Hospitalization was recommended for the patient. After ruling out other possibilities, he was eventually diagnosed with nonketotic hyperglycemic hemichorea-hemiballismus. Intensive glycemic control was immediately started with subcutaneous injection and acupuncture treatment at "governor vessel 13 acupoints", and the involuntary movements completely disappeared on the ninth day of hospitalization. The pathophysiology of nonketotic hyperglycemic hemichorea-hemiballismus is unclear. Different patient histories lead to different brain tissue conditions, and relapses and uncontrolled blood glucose add difficulties to treatment. According to Traditional Chinese Medicine theory, insufficient kidney essence leads to brain dystrophy and causes the symptoms of hemichorea-hemiballismus. Research evidence has shown that acupuncture at "governor vessel 13 acupoints" has a beneficial treatment effect on nonketotic hyperglycemic hemichorea-hemiballismus.

Glycosylated hemoglobin level in diagnosis and management of gestational diabetes mellitus / 中华围产医学杂志

Objective To evaluate the value of glycosylated hemoglobin (HbAlc) level in glucose monitoring,insulin therapy and neonatal birth weight prognosis in gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) patients.Methods Data of 1074 women who were diagnosed as GDM and delivered at Peking University First Hospital between January 1,2005 and August 31,2011 were collected and retrospective analysis was conducted.The relationship of HbAlc level with plasma glucose level of oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT),insulin administration and neonatal birth weight were investigated with Pearson correlation analysis,Logistic regression analysis or receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve.Results OGTT was done on 1074 women with (31.8± 4.0) years old during the second and third trimester and diagnosed GDM at (27.6 ± 3.4) weeks of gestational age.Among them,glucose level of fasting and 1 and 2 hours after OGTT were (5.2 ± 0.7),(10.9± 1.4) and (9.4±1.5) mmol/L.The levels of HbAlcwere (5.57±0.48)％ at the fist time of HbAlc testing at (31.8±4.3) weeks of gestational age.(1)The average value of HbAlc in 726 women determined at one month after OGTT was (5.54±0.47)％,and increased from (5.34±0.41)％ in women with one abnormal item in OGTT to (5.47±0.41)％ and (5.71±0.46)％ in women with two or three abnormal items inOGTT (t=3.025 and 6.399,all P＜0.01).(2) HbAlc level in women received insulin therapy was higher than those who did not [(5.78±0.58) ％ vs (5.42±0.37) ％,t=9.431,P＜0.01].The sensitivity and specificity were 57.8％ and 75.5％ respectively in predicting insulin requirement in women with GDM at the cut-off value of 5.67％ for HbAlc (Logistics analysis:OR＝6.847,95％CI:4.588-10.218,P＜0.01).(3) Maternal HbAlc levelat the third trimester was higher in large for gestational age(LGA) group than that in non-LGA group [(5.75±0.52)％ vs (5.54±0.42)％,t=6.845,P＜0.01].The sensitivity and specificity were 44.8％ and 73.8％ respectively in predicting LGA at the cut-off value of 5.75％ for HbAlc (Logistics analysis:OR=2.187,95％CI:2.097-3.783,P＜0.01).(4) Maternal HbAlc level at the third trimester was higher in macrosomia group than that in non-macrosomia group [(5.88±0.53)％ vs (5.57±0.45)％,t=5.990,P＜0.01].The sensitivity and specificity were 50.4％ and 79.8％ respectively in predicting macrosomia at the cut-off value of 5.85％ for HbAlc (Logistics analysis:OR=3.299,95％CI:2.237-4.865,P＜0.01).Conclusions HbAlc level at the time of GDM diagnosis could imply the severity of disease and might predict insulin requirement.While maternal HbAlc level at the third trimester may predict the occurrence of LGA and macrosomia.

Evaluation on Acupuncture Treatment of Primary Insomnia / 针刺研究

Acupuncture treatment of insomnia has been reported for many years,but its validity remains controversial up to now.In the present review,the authors took "Acupuncture","Insomnia" as the key words to do a literature search from databases in both Chinese and English via computer retrieval system and also conducted a hand-made retrieval from journals of Chinese medicine as Chinese Acu-moxibustion,and collections of theses of the related academic conferences.Then,they made a systemic evaluation on the original articles from methodology,diagnosis,criteria for the enlisted and excluded patients,intervention methods of acupuncture and control groups,standards for assessing the curative efficacy,follow-up visit,etc.Of the retrieved 80 clinical articles,20 are RCT(randomized controlled trails) composed of 1907 cases,including 4 high-quality trails and 16 lower-quality trails.Regarding the assessment of the therapeutic effect,measuring scales are often adopted in overseas studies,while in domestic researches,self-drawn standards are frequently used.In conclusion,there have had no high-quality clinical trails about acupuncture treatment of primary insomnia in China at the present,and the related evaluating methods could not definitely confirm the efficacy of acupuncture in relieving insomnia.Therefore,a strict and scientific clinical trail scheme being in line with evidence-based medicine is urgently needed in the coming studies on acupuncture treatment of primary insomnia.