Therapeutic Observation on Acupuncture plus Rehabilitation for Upper-limb Spasticity after Cerebral Apoplexy

Objective To observe the clinical efficacy of acupuncture plus rehabilitation in treating upper-limb spasticity after cerebral apoplexy.Method A hundred patients with upper-limb spasticity after cerebral apoplexy were randomized into a treatment group and a control group,50 in each.The treatment group received acupuncture at Jing-well points and points on upper limb for anti-spasticity to achieve a real-time relief,followed by rehabilitation training.The control group only received rehabilitation training.Before and after treatment,Modified Ashworth Scale,Function of Motor Activity of upper limb(FMA),and Activities of Daily Living(ADL) from Functional Comprehensive Assessment(FCA) were adopted for evaluation.Result The total effective rate was 90.0% in the treatment group versus 78.0% in the control group,and the difference was statistically significant(P0.05).Both groups had significant changes in FMA and FCA scores after treatment(P0.01).In comparing FMA and FCA scores after treatment,the treatment group was markedly different from the control group(P0.05,P0.01).Conclusion Integrated use of acupuncture and rehabilitation is an effective approach in treating upper-limb spasticity after cerebral apoplexy.