Background: Acupuncture at specific acupoints has experimentally been found to reduce chronically elevated blood pressure. Objective: To examine effectiveness of electroacupuncture (EA) at select acupoints to reduce systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressures (DBP) in hypertensive patients. Design: Two-arm parallel study. Patients: Sixty-five hypertensive patients not receiving medication were assigned randomly to one of the two acupuncture intervention (33 versus 32 patients). Intervention: Patients were assessed with 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring. They were treated with 30-minutes of EA at PC 5-6+ST 36-37 or LI 6-7+GB 37-39 once weekly for 8 weeks. Four acupuncturists provided single-blinded treatment. Main outcome measures: Primary outcomes measuring effectiveness of EA were peak and average SBP and DBP. Secondary outcomes examined underlying mechanisms of acupuncture with plasma norepinephrine, renin, and aldosterone before and after 8 weeks of treatment. Outcom...

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Long-Lasting Reduction of Blood Pressure by Electroacupuncture in Patients with Hypertension: Randomized Controlled Trial.

Hypertension continues to be a major contributor to global morbidity and mortality, fuelled by an abundance of patients with uncontrolled blood pressure despite the multitude of pharmacological options available. This may occur as a consequence of true resistant hypertension, through an inability to tolerate current pharmacological therapies, or non-adherence to antihypertensive medication. In recent years, there has been a rapid expansion of device-based therapies proposed as novel non-pharmacological approaches to treating resistant hypertension. In this review, we discuss seven novel devices-renal nerve denervation, baroreflex activation therapy, carotid body ablation, central iliac arteriovenous anastomosis, deep brain stimulation, median nerve stimulation, and vagal nerve stimulation. We highlight how the devices differ, the varying degrees of evidence available to date and upcoming trials. This review also considers the possible factors that may enable appropriate device selection for different hypertension phenotypes.

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Device-based Therapy for Hypertension.

Parkinson's disease is a neurodegenerative disorder. Parkinson's clinical feature is characterized by its motor manifestations, although its many nonmotor symptoms occur earlier and have more profound impact on the quality of patient's life. Acupuncture has been increasingly popular and has been used to treat patients with Parkinson's. In this article, we have studied the clinical reports of acupuncture treatment for Parkinson's, which were listed in Medline, PubMed, EMBASE, CNKI, and CINAHL databases in the past 15 years. It was found that acupuncture either manual or electroacupuncture stimulation at specific acupoints relieved some motor symptoms in patients with Parkinson's and markedly improved many nonmotor symptoms such as psychiatric disorders, sleep problems, and gastrointestinal symptoms. When it was used as an adjunct for levodopa, acupuncture improved therapeutic efficacy and reduced dosage and the occurrence of side effects of levodopa. However, the results were constrained by small sample sizes, methodological flaws, and blinding methods of studies. Although the evidence for the effectiveness of acupuncture for treating Parkinson's is inconclusive, therapeutic potential of acupuncture seems quite promising. More studies, either comparative effectiveness research or high-quality placebo-controlled clinical studies are warranted.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/cns.12507

Effect of Acupuncture on the Motor and Nonmotor Symptoms in Parkinson's Disease--A Review of Clinical Studies

Acupuncture lowers blood pressure (BP) in hypertension, but mechanisms underlying its action are unclear. To simulate clinical studies, we performed electroacupuncture (EA) in unanesthetized rats with cold-induced hypertension (CIH) induced by six weeks of cold exposure (6 °C). EA (0.1 – 0.4 mA, 2 Hz) was applied at ST36-37 acupoints overlying the deep peroneal nerve for 30 min twice weekly for five weeks while sham-EA was conducted with the same procedures as EA except for no electrical stimulation. Elevated BP was reduced after six sessions of EA treatment and remained low 72 hrs after EA in 18 CIH rats, but not in sham-EA (n = 12) and untreated (n = 6) CIH ones. The mRNA level of preproenkephalin in the rostral ventrolateral medulla (rVLM) 72 hr after EA was increased (n = 9), compared to the sham-EA (n = 6), untreated CIH rats (n = 6) and normotensive control animals (n = 6). Microinjection of ICI 174,864, a δ-opioid receptor antagonist, into the rVLM of EA-treated CIH rats partially reversed EA’s effect on elevated BP (n = 4). Stimulation of rVLM of CIH rats treated with sham-EA using a δ-opioid agonist, DADLE, decreased BP (n = 6). These data suggest that increased enkephalin in the rVLM induced by repetitive EA contributes to BP lowering action of EA.

/pdf/repetitive-electroacupuncture-attenuates-cold-induced-c6xsf5dd11.pdf

Repetitive Electroacupuncture Attenuates Cold-Induced Hypertension through Enkephalin in the Rostral Ventral Lateral Medulla

Despite having made substantial progress in academic rigor over the past decades, acupuncture research has been the focus of long-standing and persistent attacks by skeptics. One recurring...

What Is the Point? The Problem with Acupuncture Research That No One Wants to Talk About

Acupuncture and electroacupuncture (EA) are being used to treat hypertension (HTN). However, its mechanisms are unknown. The present study apply EA in patients with mild to moderate HTN (BP 145-180/90‑110 mmHg). A group of 42 hypertensive patients without medication were assessed with 24 hr BP monitoring, EA at P 5-6 and S 36-37 once weekly for 30 min for eight weeks. After eight weeks treatment, 31 (71%) patients demonstrated significant (P<0.05) reduction at peak (12 mmHg) and average (8 mmHg) SBP/24hrs. The peak and average DBP/24hrs decreased 6 and 5 mmHg,respectively (P<0.05). Heart rate was unchanged. After termination of EA treatment, SBP remained reduced for four weeks but after eight weeks returned to higher levels. Twelve patients (29%) did not respond to the EA treatment. Both SBP and DBP/24hrs were not reduced in 33 other patients treated with control acupoints (LI 6-7+G 37-39). This beneficial effect of EA was slow in onset but long-lasting. After eight weeks of EA treatment, the respon...

Dongmei Liu

Papers

Long-Lasting Reduction of Blood Pressure by Electroacupuncture in Patients with Hypertension: Randomized Controlled Trial.

Long-lasting inhibitory effect of electroacupuncture in hypertensive patients role of catecholamine, renin and angiotension (1140.3)