ArticleFrontiers in psychiatry2021
Acupuncture for Subthreshold Depression: Study Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial.
Article in Frontiers in psychiatry, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Acupuncture for subthreshold depression: a randomized controlled trial.BMC complementary medicine and therapies · 2025Trial
- Efficacy of Acupuncture Combined With Pharmacotherapy for Depression: A Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial.Alpha psychiatry · 2026Article
- Optimized Implementation Strategies for Traditional Chinese Medicine Management Interventions in Sub-Healthy Elderly Population and Their Impact on Quality of Life Enhancement.Clinical interventions in aging · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundSubthreshold depression refers to a state of mental sub-health that has depressive symptoms but does not meet the diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder. It is a strong risk factor for depression and is related to an increase in suicide and mortality. Studies suggest that acupuncture may be effective in the treatment of subthreshold depression, but no evidence has proven that the efficacy of acupuncture for subthreshold depression is a specific therapeutic effect or a placebo effect.
methodsThis will be a prospective, randomized, controlled, and double-blind study of 64 patients with subthreshold depression. They will be randomly assigned as verum or minimal acupuncture group members. Patients in the verum acupuncture group will receive acupuncture at the acupoints, and those in the minimal acupuncture group will receive minimal acupuncture at non-acupoints. The interventions will be delivered over an 8-week period. The primary outcome measure will be the Hamilton Depression Scale-17 (HAMD-17). The secondary outcome measures will be the 9-item Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), 7-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7), and SF-12v2 Health Survey. The assessments will occur at baseline, 4 weeks, 8 weeks, and during a follow-up period. DISCUSSION: The protocol uses a randomized controlled trial to examine the effectiveness of acupuncture for subthreshold depression and to further study the mechanisms of its effect.
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