Alternative Health Blog

In a randomized study involving 77 patients with mild-to-moderate idiopathic carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS), treatment with acupuncture (8 treatments in 4 weeks) was found to be associated with significant lasting improvements in global symptom score (GSS) assessments, distal motor latencies, and distal sensory latencies, when compared to subjects who received treatment with steroids (20 mg/d prednisolone for 2 weeks, followed by 10 mg/d for 2 weeks), over the course of a 1-year follow-up. Moreover, the changes in GSS were associated with improvements in electrophysiological assessments. Comparing the two groups, the acupuncture group was found to have lesser percentages of treatment failure (10.5% vs. 33.3% at month 7 and 15.8 vs. 51.3% at month 13) lesser percentages of moderate improvement (2.6% vs. 7.7% at month 7 and 2.6 vs. 0 at month 13), and great percentages of showing good improvement (86.8% vs. 59% at month 7 and 81.6% vs. 48.7% at month 13), as compared to subjects who were treated with steroids. The authors conclude, "This article demonstrates that short-term acupuncture treatment may result in long-term improvement in mild-to-moderate idiopathic CTS. Acupuncture treatment can be considered as an alternative therapy to other conservative treatments for those who do not opt for early surgical decompression."