Acupuncture therapy is more effective than artificial tears for dry eye syndrome: evidence based on a meta-analysis.

Lei Yang,Hui Song,Hong Yu,Zongguo Yang

doi:10.1155/2015/143858

Abstract

Background. The efficacy of acupuncture in dry eye syndrome patients remains controversial. Methods. Pubmed, Ovid, Cochrane libraries, CNKI, Wanfang, and CQVIP databases were electronically searched until October 1, 2014. Outcomes including tear break-up time (BUT), Schirmer I test (SIT), and cornea fluorescein staining (CFS) were analyzed. A meta-analysis was performed using both fixed- and random-effects models based on heterogeneity across studies. Results. Seven studies were included in this study; 198 and 185 patients were randomly treated with acupuncture and artificial tears, respectively. The overall BUT of patients in acupuncture group was significantly longer than that of the artificial tears group after treatment (P < 0.00001). The SIT was significantly higher in the acupuncture group than that in the artificial tears group after treatment (P = 0.001). The CFS of patients in acupuncture group was significantly improved compared to that in artificial group (P < 0.0001). Conclusions. Acupuncture therapy is effective for the dry eye patients, partly better than artificial tear treatment.

Highlights

Dry eye syndrome, a worldwide health burden, is a common ocular disorder of the tear film caused by decreased tear production or increased evaporation
Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine used: “dry eye syndrome,” “dry eye,” “xerophthalmia,” “keratoconjunctivitis sicca,” “Gan Yan Zheng,” “Gan Yan,” “Zhen Ci,” “Zhen Jiu,” and “acupuncture.” Electronic searches were supplemented with manual searches of reference lists of all retrieved review articles, primary studies, and abstracts from meetings to identify other studies not found in the electronic searches
Considering that no significant heterogeneity was found among the included studies [25, 26] when comparing cornea fluorescein staining (CFS) of posttreatment between acupuncture and artificial tears (P = 0.42, I2 = 0%, Figure 5), our analysis showed that the CFS of patients in acupuncture group had a significant improvement than that of artificial tears group (P < 0.0001, Figure 5)

Summary

Introduction

A worldwide health burden, is a common ocular disorder of the tear film caused by decreased tear production or increased evaporation. Some systematic reviews [9,10,11], which include papers that used thunder-fire miraculous moxa in treatment group, concluded proved limited evidence that acupuncture has effectiveness than artificial tears. The efficacy of acupuncture in dry eye syndrome patients remains controversial. The overall BUT of patients in acupuncture group was significantly longer than that of the artificial tears group after treatment (P < 0.00001). The SIT was significantly higher in the acupuncture group than that in the artificial tears group after treatment (P = 0.001). The CFS of patients in acupuncture group was significantly improved compared to that in artificial group (P < 0.0001). Acupuncture therapy is effective for the dry eye patients, partly better than artificial tear treatment

Methods

Results

Conclusion