Acupuncture May Improve Quality of Life in Menopausal Women: A Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

This analysis aims to identify, on the basis of the results of randomized controlled trials (RCTs), whether acupuncture therapy can alleviate menopausal symptoms and promote health-related quality of life.

We included RCTs that directly compared any type of acupuncture with sham acupuncture in treating menopause-related symptoms and which were published from January 1, 2010 to December 31, 2016 in 6 electronic databases. Two authors performed this work independently; 'risk-of-bias' assessment and data extraction were also independently performed by these 2 review authors. The outcomes are presented as scores of the menopause rating scale (MRS), which represents the self-assessment of patients.

Six studies were included. Our analysis found that acupuncture can reduce the MRS score in menopausal women by the end of the treating period (2-3 months, on average) and even in the follow-up period (1-3 months), not only in the total score but also in each subscale score. But the grade of evidence is very low.

Both the total score and the subgroup analysis strongly indicated that acupuncture can alleviate menopause-related symptoms. However, the evidence is not very strong. Thus, further studies about the efficiency of acupuncture on menopausal symptoms based on well-designed trials are needed.