Effects of acupuncture on age-related macular degeneration: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

BACKGROUND: In recent years, an increasing number of patients with age-related macular degeneration (AMD) have received acupuncture treatment, but there has been no systematic review to evaluate the effect of acupuncture on patients with AMD. PURPOSE: This meta-analysis aims to review the clinical efficacy of acupuncture in the treatment of AMD. METHODS: Randomized controlled trials up to September 4, 2022 were searched in the following databases: PubMed, Ovid Medline, Embase, Cochrane Library, The Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure Database, VIP, Wanfang, and SINOMED. Two reviewers independently performed literature screening and data extraction. RevMan 5.4 was used for the meta-analysis. RESULTS: Nine of the 226 articles were finally included. A total of 508 AMD patients (631 eyes) were enrolled, including 360 dry eyes and 271 wet eyes. The results showed that acupuncture alone or as an adjunct therapy improved both the clinical efficacy and best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) of AMD patients and reduced their central macular thickness. The certainty of the evidence ranged from "low" to "very low". CONCLUSION: There is no high-quality evidence that acupuncture is effective in treating patients with AMD; patients with dry AMD may benefit from acupuncture treatment. Considering the potential of acupuncture treatment for AMD, it is necessary to conduct a rigorously designed randomized controlled trials to verify its efficacy.