Meta-analysis of the Effectiveness of Acupuncture Treatment in Dry Eye Disease

In this research, it was aimed to evaluate effectiveness of acupuncture treatment in dry eye disease by using meta-analysis. In total, 10 researches with 11 samples were used in the study among evaluated 645 researches on acupuncture on academic databases. Female and male ratios, ages, Ocular Surface Disease Index (OSDI) and Schirmer I test (SIT) levels of patients in researches were recorded. In total, 349 patients were subjected to the study including 260 (74.50%) female and 89 male (25.50%) dry eye patients. Mean age was 50.46 with 22.37-60.71 range. Initial OSDI mean was 50.46 and final OSDI mean was 34.71 with -14.32 mean OSDI difference. SIT difference mean was 0.96 with 5.92 initial and 7.75 final mean values. Spearman’s rho correlation analysis results showed that female frequency, male frequency and age were not significantly correlated with OSDI and SIT difference (p>0.05). Generalized Linear model (Logit) results showed that age had significant effect on OSDI difference (OR=-0.205; p<0.05), and effects of gender and age on SIT difference were statistically insignificant (p>0.05).Acupuncture provides important results in terms of stimulating the lacrimal glands in patients with dry eyes and allowing more tears to be produced. Although acupuncture method provides effective results for both genders, its effect is more in young individuals than in older individuals.