SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Med.
Sec. Family Medicine and Primary Care
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2025.1592220
A Meta Analysis of the Acupoint Catgut Embedding in the Treatment of Functional Constipation
Provisionally accepted
- 1Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, Beijing Municipality, China
- 2Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Objective: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of acupoint embedding for FC by meta-analysis, in order to provide evidence-based medical evidence for clinical practice. Methods: A comprehensive literature search was conducted in China National Knowledge Infrastructure, WanFang, VIP, PubMed, Web of Science and The Cochrane Library for randomised controlled trials (RCTs) on ACE for FC published from inception to November 2024. The included studies were assessed for quality using the modified Jadad scale, and statistical analysis was performed using RevMan 5.4.1 and Stata BE 17. Results: A total of 23 studies involving 1,794 patients were included. The meta-analysis showed that the total effective rate of ACE was significantly higher compared with oral Western medicine (odds ratio [OR]=2.71, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.91-3.83, P<0.00001), acupuncture (OR=2.90, 95% CI: 1.68-5.01, P=0.0001) and placebo groups (P<0.05). There was no significant difference between ACE and oral Chinese medicine (OR=2.34, 95% CI: 0.79-6.89, P=0.12). The incidence of adverse reactions in the ACE group was low, presenting mainly as mild local discomfort such as soreness, bruising and pain, which were self-limiting. Conclusion: Acupoint catgut embedding demonstrates superior clinical efficacy compared with Western medicine, acupuncture and placebo in treating FC, with a low incidence of adverse effects. However, due to the limitations of the included studies, high-quality, large-sample RCTs are still needed to verify the long-term efficacy and safety of ACE.
Keywords: Acupoint catgut embedding, Functional constipation, Meta-analysis, Randomised controlled trial, Evidence-Based Medicine
Received: 12 Mar 2025; Accepted: 04 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhao, Wang, Kuang and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Shuxin Zhang, Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.