Effect of Minimal Acupuncture for Infantile Colic: A Multicentre, Three-Armed, Single-Blind, Randomised Controlled Trial (Acu-Col)
Landgren K, Hallström I · Acupuncture in Medicine · 2017 June
DOI 10.1136/acupmed-2016-011208
Objective
To investigate and compare the effects of two types of acupuncture, as an adjunct to standard care, with no acupuncture in infants with colic attending public child health centres.
Conclusions
Acupuncture appears to safely reduce crying in infants with colic, with both acupuncture approaches producing similar benefits and outperforming gold standard care alone.
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Insights
Acupuncture delivered by experienced nurses reduced crying in infants with colic more effectively than supportive standard care alone, without serious harms.
Infants with colic attending public child health centres were randomly assigned to receive either minimal standardised acupuncture, individually tailored acupuncture based on traditional Chinese medicine, or no acupuncture. All groups received usual care alongside additional health-centre visits providing parental advice and support, while parents and centre nurses assessing outcomes were unaware of group allocation. Parents recorded infant crying and fussing in diaries throughout treatment and follow-up.
Both acupuncture approaches produced similar improvements and reduced total crying and colicky crying more than supportive standard care alone. Infants who received acupuncture were also more likely to fall below the daily crying threshold used to define colic during the treatment period. No serious adverse events were reported.
