ReviewScars, burns & healing
Efficacy of acupuncture in treating scars following tissue trauma.
Review in Scars, burns & healing. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 18 citations in OpenAlex.
- Heart Rate Variability Subsequent to Auriculotherapy Among Individuals Afflicted by Major Burn Scars.Annals of plastic surgery · 2025Article
- Acupuncture in Dentistry: A Comprehensive Review of Its Applications, Mechanisms, and Clinical Efficacy.Cureus · 2025Review
- Dry Needling and Acupuncture for Scars-A Systematic Review.Journal of clinical medicine · 2024Review
- Korean Medicine Subcision Therapies in Scar Treatment: A Retrospective, Multicenter Study at Network Clinics.Clinical, cosmetic and investigational dermatology · 2024Article
- Summaries of the Padua symposium on myofascial pain, fibromyalgia, and fascial pain disorders, June 2023,European journal of translational myology · 2023Article
- Combination of Battlefield Acupuncture and Local Point Acupuncture for Post Laparotomy Scar Pain.Medical acupuncture · 2022Article
- Diagnosis, Treatment, and Management of Painful Scar: A Narrative Review.Journal of pain research · 2022Review
- Efficacy of Dry Needling in Treating Scars following Total Hip Arthroplasty: A Case Report.Medical journal of the Islamic Republic of Iran · 2022Article
- Furnishing Wound Repair by the Subcutaneous Fascia.International journal of molecular sciences · 2021Review
- Clinical observation for acupuncture treatment of a small area of hyperplastic scars in young and middle-aged women.Medicine · 2020Article
- Needling: is there a point?The Journal of manual & manipulative therapy · 2019Article
- Efficacy of acupuncture in treating scars following tissue trauma.Scars, burns & healingReview
- Case study: Pilot testing of a local acupuncture intervention protocol for burn scars.Scars, burns & healingArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionAnecdotally, acupuncture is used in the treatment of scar tissue in order to improve scar quality and reduce symptoms of pain and pruritus. Unlike conditions such as lower back pain, knee osteoarthritis and migraines, there are no systematic reviews to confirm treatment efficacy. This systematic literature review aims to assess the current level of evidence for the use of acupuncture for treating abnormal scars such as hypertrophic or other symptomatic scars.
methodsA comprehensive database search was performed followed by reviewing reference lists, grey literature databases and Google Scholar. Study quality was assessed using the Oregon CONSORT STRICTA instrument (OCSI) for clinical trials and the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) checklist for case reports.
resultsThe search strategy discovered five case studies, one retrospective cohort study, one cohort study and three clinical trials that investigated the use of acupuncture for scars. Studies rated as low to moderate quality (26-50%) on the OCSI checklist due to lack of detailed reporting, use of non-validated outcome measures and heterogeneity of participant cohorts. Three case studies rated as moderate quality (5-6/8) and two as low quality (<2/8) on the JBI checklist. DISCUSSION: All studies reported positive outcomes for the use of acupuncture for scar symptoms; however, treatment frequency, duration, number of treatments and points used varied between studies.
conclusionAcupuncture for the treatment of abnormal scars has a low level of evidence thus requiring further well-designed, controlled trials to be performed. Recommended treatment protocols for future studies have been provided.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.