SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Public Mental Health
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1624648
This article is part of the Research TopicExploration in Innovative Approaches to Understanding and Treating Mood Disorders: Evaluating Efficacy, Mechanisms, and Therapeutic TargetsView all 6 articles
Effect of acupuncture on neuroinflammatory responses in depression animals: a systematic review and meta-analysis
Provisionally accepted
- 1Clinical Medical of Acupuncture, Moxibustion and Rehabilitation, Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou, China, Guangzhou, China
- 2The First Clinical Medical School, Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou, China, Guangzhou, China
- 3The First Afffliated Hospital of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine, Guangzhou, China, Guangzhou, China
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Background: Depression causes many negative effects and even death to patients, the burden on society is also heavy in terms of economics. The neuroinflammatory mechanism of acupuncture regulating depression is unclear. Thus, this study evaluated the effect of acupuncture on neuroinflammatory responses in depression animals, and provide a clinical reference for depression treatment. Methods: Web of science, Embase, the Cochrane Library, Pubmed, CNKI, WanFang, CBM, VIP databases were searched. The SYRCLE Risk of Bias Tool was used to assess bias in the studies. Meta-analysis was performed using Stata 15.0. The sources of heterogeneity were explored using subgroup analysis, and stability was evaluated using sensitivity analysis. Quality of evidence for outcomes was assessed using GDT. Results: This study included studies and animals. According to meta-analysis, compared with the control group, acupuncture significantly reduced IL-1β (SMD:-1.62, 95% CI:-1.93, -1.31), IL-6 (SMD:-1.89, 95% CI:-2.51, -1.26), and TNF-α in depression animals (SMD:-2.09, 95%CI:-2.83, -1.34), improved IL-4 (SMD:1.01, 95%CI:0.35, 1.67), IL-10 (SMD:0.77, 95%CI:0.26, 1.28), body weight (SMD:1.69, 95%CI:1.23, 2.15), crossing numbers (SMD:1.74, 95%CI:1.31, 2.17) and rearing numbers (SMD:1.77, 95%CI:1.16, 2.39). Conclusion: Acupuncture has the potential to alleviate depression by attenuating neuroinflammatory responses, and the mechanism may be related to modulating the release of inflammatory factors as well as regulating the activation of microglia.
Keywords: Acupuncture, Neuroinflammatory, Depression, Animals, depressive-likebehaviors, Meta-analysis, Systematic review
Received: 07 May 2025; Accepted: 16 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Ni, Zhang, Qi, Huang, Li and Duan. 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: Lining Duan, 2282351590@qq.com
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