Acupuncture and relaxation response for substance use disorder recovery

Abstract

Background & Aims: Substance abuse is a major health problem in the US population, particularly among veterans. Current treatments for substance abuse in the form of pharmacologic, behavioural, or psychosocial therapy can be effective in limited instances. We investigated the effect of using two complementary and alternative approaches, acupuncture and the relaxation response, to treat veterans who are recovering from substance use disorders.

Methods: We conducted a controlled trial at a US Veterans Administration homeless residential rehabilitation programme. Study participants were randomly assigned to acupuncture, relaxation response or usual care groups.

Results: Both acupuncture and the relaxation response interventions were well received by the veterans with high intervention attendance rates (75% and 80%, respectively). The acupuncture group had significantly greater reductions in craving and anxiety levels and greater improvements in the spirituality dimension of quality of life, while the relaxation response group had significantly greater reductions in anxiety level and greater improvements in mental health and spirituality dimensions of quality of life than usual care. The two intervention groups had no significant difference in any outcome measures.

Conclusions: This trial provided promising pilot data for larger studies to validate the effects of acupuncture and the relaxation response for relapse prevention.

Keywords:

• Substance use disorder
• acupuncture
• relaxation response
• randomized control trial
• recovery

Acknowledgements

This study was supported by the US Department of Defense through the Samueli Institute. Parts of the results of the manuscript were presented as abstracts at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Clinical Trials in 2008, in the United States, and the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association in 2008, in the United States. We thank all the research staff members who were involved in this study, study acupuncturists: John Coville, Sandra Gray, Teresa Langaas, study clinical psychologist: Marcie Maccaro, study coordinator: Cristi DeMarco, and Programmer/Analyst: Yue Zhao. We also thank the staff at the VA domiciliary program for hosting the study and the veterans for participating in the study.

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.