Acupuncture for Athletic Injuries: A protocol for systematic review and meta analysis

Background: Athletic Injuries is a major cause of pain and functional limitation.Purpose: To evaluate the effects of acupuncture for treating Athletic Injuries.Data Synthesis: Seventeen trials met the selection criteria, including 17 reported sufficient data. Standardized mean differences were calculated by using differences in improvements from baseline between patients assigned to acupuncture and those assigned to control groups. Compared with patients in waiting list control groups, patients who received acupuncture reported clinically relevant improvements in pain (standardized mean difference, -1.20 [95% CI, -1.84 to -0.56]. Patients who received acupuncture also reported clinically relevant improvements in pain and function compared with patients in usual care control groups. Compared with a sham control, acupuncture provided clinically relevant improvements in CK (standardized mean difference, -2.50 [95% CI, -24.73 to -0.27]) and clinically relevant improvements in LDH (standardized mean difference, -5.63 [95% CI, -16.03 to 4.77]) and in Lysholm (standardized mean difference, -0. 76 [95% CI, -1.52 to -0.01]).Limitation: The inconsistent results of the controlled trials may be due to the variability of cupuncture and sham protocols, patient samples, and settings.Conclusions: The controlled trials show clinically relevant benefits of acupuncture for treating Athletic Injuries.