Acupuncture Therapies for Individuals with Overweight or Obesity: An Overview of Systematic Reviews

Abstract

Purpose

An increasing number of people are affected by overweight or obesity, and the personal and social health burden is growing rapidly. Acupuncture is gaining popularity as an alternative treatment to manage weight. This research aims to update and synthesize the evidence of acupuncture therapies from systematic reviews for treating overweight and obesity.

Methods

Nine databases were searched from their inception to March 2022. Overweight or obesity was classified using standard diagnostic criteria. Published systematic reviews that included randomized controlled trials and quasi-randomized studies were eligible. Quality was assessed via the AMSTAR-2 scale and risk of bias using the ROBIS tool.

Results

Thirty-eight systematic reviews were identified. Acupuncture therapies and auricular acupoint stimulation showed benefits in terms of reducing body weight and body mass index. Catgut embedding therapy and abdominal acupuncture are currently not in widespread use with insufficient evidence. Acupuncture therapies appear to be safe. Most of the reviews were assessed as having high risk of bias and low confidence in the findings.

Conclusion

There is a need for larger and more methodologically sound randomized controlled trials to evaluate the effectiveness of acupuncture therapies for individuals who are affected by overweight or obesity.

Keywords:

• acupuncture
• overweight
• obesity
• systematic review

Data Sharing Statement

All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in this article and its supplementary material files. Further enquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Disclosure

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the publication of this article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the China–Australia International Research Centre for Chinese Medicine (CAIRCCM)—a joint initiative of RMIT University, Australia, and the Guangdong Provincial Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, China. We also received additional funding from the National Key R&D Program of China [Grant No. 2019YFC1709802], Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine [2019 General Program, Grant No. YN2019ML01 and 2019 Treating Potential Disease Program, YN2019ZWB01] and Traditional Chinese Medicine Bureau of Guangdong Province [2020 General Program, Grant No. 20202068].