Efficacy of acupuncture therapy for improving anorexia in tumor patients: a Meta-analysi.

OBJECTIVE

To use evidence-based medicine to systematically evaluate the effectiveness and safety of acupuncture therapy for improving anorexia in tumor patients.

METHODS

We queried the China National Knowledge Infrastructure Database (CNKI), China Science and Technology Journal Database (VIP), Wanfang Data, PubMed, Cochrane Library, and Embase databases to identify reports of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that applied acupuncture therapy to improve anorexia in tumor patients, and used Rev Man 5.3 software to conduct a Meta-analysis of the effective rate, appetite score, Karnofsky Performance Status (KPS) score, Functional Assessment of Anorexia/Cachexia Therapy (FAACT) appetite scale, and body weight in each study. Subgroup analysis was conducted based on whether radiotherapy or chemotherapy were also administered.

RESULTS

A total of 10 RCTs were included with a total of 648 patients, including 343 patients in the treatment group and 305 patients in the control group. The Meta-analysis results showed that the clinical efficacy, appetite score, KPS score, and FAACT score of the treatment group (which received acupuncture to improve appetite) were better than those of the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P < 0.05); however, there was no statistically significant difference in body weight between the treatment group and the control group (P > 0.05). The results of the subgroup analysis showed that the effective rate and appetite score for patients with long-term and chronic loss of appetite who underwent acupuncture were better than those of the control group, and the difference was statistically significant (P < 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

Acupuncture therapy has good efficacy and safety in the treatment of anorexia in tumor patients, and it also has good efficacy and safety for long-term and chronic loss of appetite. The reliability and stability of the above results need to be confirmed by high-quality RCTs with larger sample sizes.