Zhang Yan, Bao Fei, Wang Yan, Wu Zhihong
Department of Radiology, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Peking Union Medical College & Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences Beijing, China.
Department of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Peking Union Medical College Hospital, Peking Union Medical College & Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences Beijing, China.
Am J Transl Res. 2016 Sep 15;8(9):3995-4002. eCollection 2016.
As two major non-operative methods, physiotherapy and acupuncture have been proved to be safe and effective in osteoarthritis (OA) treatment. However, only a little study focused on functions of both methods on cartilage repairing. The main goal of this research is to prove and compare effectiveness of acupuncture and physiotherapy on OA, and to explore their possible efficacy on cartilage repairing. One hundred knees of 50 participants with knee osteoarthritis (KOA) were randomly divided into acupuncture group and physiotherapy group. Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) was used to evaluate the motor function of knee joints, followed by MRI scanning to measure T2 values in ten cartilage sub-regions in tibiofemoral joints. Significant lower scores of total WOMAC and three subscales on the 4th weekend were observed in both groups than those of the baseline (P < 0.01). For acupuncture group, scores of total WOMAC and three subscales for pain, stiffness and physical function on 4th weekend were significantly lower than those of the physiotherapy group (P < 0.01 and P < 0.05). T2 values in anterior medial tibial sub-region (MTa) and anterior lateral tibial sub-region (LTa) were significantly lower in acupuncture group on 4th weekend than those of the baseline (P < 0.05). No significant difference in T2 values was detected in physiotherapy group. These results indicate that acupuncture represents certain clinical effect on KOA which is superior compared with physiotherapy, and hint the possible roles of acupuncture in promoting cartilage repairing.
作为两种主要的非手术治疗方法，物理治疗和针灸已被证明在骨关节炎（OA）治疗中是安全有效的。然而，仅有少量研究关注这两种方法对软骨修复的作用。本研究的主要目的是证实并比较针灸和物理治疗对OA的疗效，并探讨它们在软骨修复方面可能的效果。将50例膝骨关节炎（KOA）患者的100个膝关节随机分为针灸组和物理治疗组。采用西安大略和麦克马斯特大学骨关节炎指数（WOMAC）评估膝关节的运动功能，随后进行MRI扫描以测量胫股关节10个软骨亚区域的T2值。两组在第4周周末时WOMAC总分及三个子量表的得分均显著低于基线水平（P < 0.01）。针灸组在第4周周末时WOMAC总分及疼痛、僵硬和身体功能三个子量表的得分显著低于物理治疗组（P < 0.01和P < 0.05）。针灸组在第4周周末时胫骨前内侧亚区域（MTa）和胫骨前外侧亚区域（LTa）的T2值显著低于基线水平（P < 0.05）。物理治疗组的T2值未检测到显著差异。这些结果表明，针灸对KOA具有一定临床疗效，优于物理治疗，并提示针灸在促进软骨修复方面可能发挥的作用。
