Recent development of acupuncture on Parkinson's disease.

OBJECTIVES

Parkinson's disease is a complex disease with multiple etiological factors involved in disease pathogenesis, and the molecular and cellular pathways for neurodegeneration are still elusive.

METHODS

We reviewed all the relevant laboratory findings regarding acupuncture mechanism on Parkinson's disease.

RESULTS

Acupuncture treatments in animal experiments have generated valuable mechanistic insights of Parkinson's disease and shown that acupuncture therapy is in fact a neuroprotective therapy which increases various neuroprotective agents such as brain-derived neurotrophic factor, glial cell line-derived neurotrophic factor and cyclophilin A. In addition, acupuncture therapy decreases cell death processes and attenuates oxidative stress to substantia nigra dopaminergic neurons.

DISCUSSION

These results suggest that early application of acupuncture therapy for Parkinson's disease patients may be helpful for the best efficacy of acupuncture treatment.