| Abstract: | Objective: Whether moxibustion therapy is effective for patients with lumbar disc herniation(LDH) is still unclear, but previous studies neglected the dose of moxibustion and usually adopted standardized 15-minute dose in the treatment of LDH.Dose of moxibustion plays an important role in obtaining good effects.Therefore, we report the protocol of a randomized controlled trial to confirm the efficacy of moxibustion for LDH and to clarify the relationship between the dose and efficacy of moxibustion for LDH.Methods: Forty participants with LDH were randomized into four groups.The small moxibustion dose group(SM), moderate moxibustion dose group(MM) and large moxibustion dose group(LM) respectively received 15-minute, 30-minute, and 60-minute treatment of suspended moxibustion on Guanyuan(CV4).The acupuncture group(AC) received acupuncture treatment as the control group.Moxibustion and acupuncture were performed a total of five times(once per week), a total of 10 treatments in a 2-week treatment period.Outcome was evaluated by VAS pain intensity and Roland Morris Questionnaire(RMQ).Results: VAS and RMQ scores were improved in the four groups during the treatment.Significant reduction in pain intensity(P0.01) and RMQ(P0.01) was shown in the LM group.After treatment, the group that received large moxibustion dosereported less pain intensity compared to the acupuncture group or the groups that received 15-minute and 30-minute treatments of moxibustion, and the differences were statistically significant(P0.05).Conclusion: The large moxibustion dose treatment may be more effective in the treatment of LDH.The time of treatment was between 15 and 60 min, and efficacy of moxibustion on CV4 gradually improved with increasing of treatment time. |
