• Jiawei Yuan, Weizhen Zhang, Beibei Qie, Yuhua Xie, Binbin Zhu, Cheng Chen, Wenwei Qiu, Huanwen Sun, Bin Zhao, and Yaqiu Long.
• Baiyun Branch, NanFang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
• Medicine (Baltimore). 2024 Oct 4; 103 (40): e39810e39810.

BackgroundIn China, acupuncture has been employed as an adjunctive therapy for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Press needle acupuncture is a special type of acupuncture that provides prolonged stimulation to acupuncture points and simultaneously reduces the pain associated with traditional acupuncture. This study assessed the effectiveness of integrating press needles alongside pharmacologic treatment in patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19.MethodsPatients hospitalized with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 symptoms between December 2022 and January 2023 were included in the study. The enrolled patients were randomly assigned to receive pharmacologic treatment alone (control group) or both pharmacologic treatment and press needle acupuncture (intervention group). Patients were evaluated for clinical outcomes, including symptom scores, deterioration rates, fever durations, and nucleic acid test results. The patients' complete blood count and C-reactive protein levels were also analyzed using venous blood samples both before and after treatment.ResultsBoth groups exhibited a reduction in clinical symptom scores, but symptoms regressed faster in the intervention group. Nucleic acid test negativity was achieved faster in the intervention group than in the control group. The intervention group also had a lower deterioration rate. Furthermore, the increase in the lymphocyte count and decrease in C-reactive protein levels following treatment were more pronounced in the intervention group than in the control group.ConclusionThis study suggests that utilizing press needle acupuncture as an adjunct to pharmacologic treatment can be effective in patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 symptoms.Copyright © 2024 the Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.

22 keywords...

hide…