Acupuncture can help reduce fatigue in MS patients #ECTRIMS

[MSUK]

Fatigue influences daily activities of patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and reduces their quality of life. Most clinical trials evaluating interventions for fatigue in MS have shown only minor benefits. So researchers have conducted a study to evaluate whether acupuncture and mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) in addition to usual care are effective in reducing fatigue in MS patients compared to usual care alone...Read more - http://www.ms-uk.org/acupuncture-can-he ... ts-ectrims

[jimmylegs]

https://bmccomplementalternmed.biomedce ... 017-1782-4

O26 Acupuncture for patients with multiple sclerosis associated fatigue – a randomized controlled trial

Daniel Pach1,2, Judit Bellmann-Strobl3,4, Yinhui Chang1,5, Laura Pasura3, Bin Liu5, Sven F Jäger3, Ronny Loerch1, Li Jin5, Benno Brinkhaus1, Miriam Ortiz1, Thomas Reinhold1, Stephanie Roll1, Sylvia Binting1, Katja Icke1, Xuemin Shi5, Friedemann Paul3,4,6, Claudia M Witt1,2

Correspondence: Daniel Pach (daniel.pach@charite.de)

Background

Fatigue influences daily activities of patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and reduces their quality of life. Most of clinical trials evaluating interventions for fatigue in MS have shown only minor benefits.

Objective

We aimed to evaluate whether 1) acupuncture or 2) mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) in addition to usual care are effective in reducing fatigue in MS patients compared to usual care alone.

Methods

We performed a single-center, randomized, three-arm, controlled trial in a university study center specialized on MS. 116 outpatients with MS and fatigue for at least 3 months and an average score of ≥ 4 on the Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS) were randomly allocated to three groups (42 acupuncture, 21 MBSR, and 41 usual care). Patients in the acupuncture group received 24 treatments within 12 weeks in addition to usual care, the MBSR group received 12 weeks of MBSR treatment in addition to usual care, and the usual care group continued any previous treatment. The primary outcome was the Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS) after 12 weeks (values 1-7, with higher values indicating more fatigue). Because of recruitment difficulties recruitment for MBSR was stopped early and only acupuncture vs. usual care was analyzed in the primary analysis (ANCOVA adjusted for baseline FSS and gender).

Results

The primary outcome fatigue (mean adjusted FSS score after 12 weeks) was 4.7 (95% CI [4.4;5.1]) in the acupuncture group and 5.4 [5.0;5.7]) in the usual care group (difference: 0.6 [0.16; 1.07], p = 0.009).

Conclusion

Acupuncture in addition to usual care was significantly superior to usual care alone. Therefore acupuncture might be beneficial for MS patients with fatigue, particularly with regard to limited treatment options for these symptoms, but more research is needed. Further outcomes will be presented at the conference.