A Korean Medicine Study on Inflammatory Acne, Focusing on Acupuncture Treatment

The present study investigated the effectiveness of acupuncture for treating inflammatory acne vulgaris by reviewing published randomized controlled trial (RCT) studies.In this review, multiple databases, including EMBASE, PubMed, Cochrane, China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Research Information Sharing Service, Oriental Medicine Advanced Searching Integrated System, and Korean studies Information Service System, were searched using the keywords "acne and Korean medicine" and "acne and acupuncture."Only RCTs were searched, and studies not meeting the inclusion criteria were eliminated.After screening 532 papers, a total of four RCTs were analyzed.Among these papers, three studies randomly assigned acne patients into the treatment and control groups, whereas the other study randomly categorized the patients into three experimental groups.The pooled results from the experimental groups receiving acupuncture demonstrated clinically significant improvements in symptoms and outcomes as compared to the control groups.This study confirmed the efficacy of acupuncture for inflammatory acne vulgaris.Moreover, no serious side effects were reported.And the recurrence rate was lower in the experimental group than in the comparison group.Therefore, acupuncture is a reliable, safe, and effective alternative treatment for inflammatory acne.To confirm our results, additional studies with a high-level of evidence including randomized, double-blind studies are necessary.