Abstract
BackgroundAcupuncture may effectively treat certain symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Although several studies have used functional brain imaging to investigate the mechanisms of acupuncture treatment on AD, these mechanisms are still poorly understood. We therefore further explored the mechanism by which needling at ST36 may have a therapeutic effect in a rat AD model.MethodsA total of 80 healthy Wistar rats were divided into healthy control (n = 15) and pre-model (n = 65) groups. After inducing AD-like disease, a total of 45 AD model rats were randomly divided into three groups: the model group (n = 15), the sham-point group (n = 15), and the ST36 group (n = 15). The above three groups underwent PET scanning. PET images were processed with SPM2.ResultsThe brain areas that were activated in the sham-point group relative to the model group were primarily centred on the bilateral limbic system, the right frontal lobe, and the striatum, whereas the activated areas in the ST36 group were primarily centred on the bilateral limbic system (pyriform cortex), the bilateral temporal lobe (olfactory cortex), the right amygdala and the right hippocampus. Compared with the sham-point group, the ST36 group showed greater activation in the bilateral amygdalae and the left temporal lobe.ConclusionWe concluded that needling at a sham point or ST36 can increase blood perfusion and glycol metabolism in certain brain areas, and thus may have a positive influence on the cognition of AD patients.
Highlights
Acupuncture may effectively treat certain symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease (AD)
Compared with the model group, the ST36 group exhibited a higher level of glycol metabolism in the pyriform cortex of the right limbic system, the olfactory cortex of the right temporal lobe, the right amygdaloid body, the right hippocampus, the pyriform cortex of the left limbic system, and the olfactory cortex of the left temporal lobe (Table 3, Figure 3)
Compared with the sham-point group, the ST36 group showed a higher level of glycol metabolism in the right amygdaloid body, the olfactory cortex of the left temporal lobe, and the left amygdaloid body (Table 4, Figure 4)
Summary
Acupuncture may effectively treat certain symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Several studies have used functional brain imaging to investigate the mechanisms of acupuncture treatment on AD, these mechanisms are still poorly understood. We further explored the mechanism by which needling at ST36 may have a therapeutic effect in a rat AD model. AD is characterised by extensive cortical neuropathology, including extracellular amyloid-containing neural plaques, intracellular neurofibrillary tangles, and cell and synapse loss in the cortical and subcortical regions of the human brain [1,2,3,4]. Acupuncture has therapeutic effects on Alzheimer’s disease [5,6,7,8,9,10]. Many studies provide different explanations as to how acupuncture may cure Alzheimer’s to study the needling of rats using PET. We selected ST-36 (Zhusanli) as the needling point with the aim of determining how needling at ST-36 affects the brain
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