Guidelines

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Over the past 20 years, a lot of scientific research has become available showing that acupuncture can be an effective form of treatment for numerous conditions. These scientific insights (evidence based*), supplemented with the clinical experience of practitioners (practice based*) and the experiences of patients, are now also finding their way into medical guidelines.
* Read about Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) here 

Contrary to what the term 'guideline' might suggest, medical guidelines are not mandatory prescriptions, but general recommendations and professional advice. Guidelines are generally written by peers for peers, for example within a specific medical specialty. Guidelines are intended to support doctors/healthcare providers and clients in making decisions about an appropriate and effective treatment for a specific health problem.

Guidelines for medical specialists in the Netherlands are compiled in the Guidelines Database of the Federation of Medical Specialists and those for general practitioners are included in the NHG standards of the Dutch College of General Practitioners.

Acupuncture in medical guidelines
It is gratifying that acupuncture is gradually being included in more medical guidelines. For example, an international bibliometric study* by Birch et al. in 2018 [1] showed that acupuncture was mentioned 2189 times as an option for treatment for over 200 health problems, 1486 times for 107 pain indications, and 703 times for 97 non-pain indications.
*Bibliometrics is the science of quantitative measurement of scientific publications.

There is still little known about the underlying reasons on the basis of which doctors ultimately refer their patients to complementary therapy or not. From a research publication in the Journal of Integrated Complementary Medicine (May 2022), it appears that doctors who do refer often do so based on:

• personal experience with a complementary treatment form
• scientific support in a peer-reviewed professional journal
• positive recommendations from colleagues
• patient findings; the feedback that the doctor receives from his patients even scores slightly better than scientific support in professional literature [2]

In the Netherlands, acupuncture is mentioned as a possible treatment option in only a limited number of medical guidelines. In other countries, acupuncture is more frequently included in guidelines. For example, the British National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) has included acupuncture in its guidelines for chronic pain and headache complaints.

Medical guidelines for specific health complaints including acupuncture will soon appear in this block. 

References:

• 1.Birch, S., Lee M.S., Alraek T. & Kim T.H., Overview of Treatment Guidelines and Clinical Practical Guidelines That Recommend the Use of Acupuncture: A Bibliometric Analysis, Review J Altern Complement Med. 2018 Aug;24(8):752-769. DOI: 10.1089/acm.2018.0092 [←]

• 2. Stussman, B.J., et al., Reasons Office-Based Physicians in the United States Recommend Common Complementary Health Approaches to Patients: An Exploratory Study Using a National Survey, J Integr Complement Med, 2022 May 12. doi: 10.1089/jicm.2022.0493. Online ahead of print. [←]