Acupuncture and regulation of gastrointestinal function

Table 1 Effect of acupuncture on gastric and colonic motility

Organ	Subjects	Methods	Findings	Ref.
Stomach	Normal mice	EA at ST-36	ST-36-gastric motility ↑	[48]
		EA at CV-12	CV-12-gastric motility ↓
	Rats with gastric mucosal damage	EA at acupoints in	Gastric motility ↑	[22]
		Foot-Yangming Meridian
	Normal mice	EA at CV-12	Gastric motility ↓	[29]
	Normal rats	EA at ST-36	Gastric motility ↑	[30]
	Dogs with impaired gastric motility induced by RD	EA at ST-36	Gastric motility ↑	[18]
	Healthy human	Manual acupuncture at	Normogastria ↓	[32]
		both PC-6 and ST-36	Bradygastria ↑
Colon	Conscious dogs	Manual acupuncture at acupoints in large intestine meridian or ST-25, BL-25, GV-1	Only GV-1-colonic motility ↓	[37]
	Conscious rats	EA at ST-36	Colonic motility ↑	[50]
	Rats with stress	EA at ST-36	Colonic motility ↓	[35]

↑, increase; ↓, decrease. EA: Electro-acupuncture; ST-36: Zusanli; CV-12: Zhongwan; PC-6: Neiguan; RD: Rectal distension; GV-1: Changqiang; ST-25: Tianshu; BL-25: Dachangshu.

Table 2 Mechanisms of acupuncture on gastrointestinal motility

Function	Subjects	Stimulation		Result	Mechanism	Ref.
		Method	Region
Gastric motility	Dogs with RD	EA	ST-36	Increase	Vagal activity	[18]
					opioid pathway
	Healthy volunteers	MA	ST-36	Increase	Vagal pathway	[21]
	Rats	EA	Foot-Yangming Meridian	Increase	Brain-gut peptide	[22]
	Wild-type mice	EA	CV-12	Decrease	TRPV1 receptor	[29]
	Rats	EA	ST-36	Increase	NMDA receptors	[30]
Colonic motility	Rats	EA	ST-36	Increase	Parasympathetic efferent pathway	[50]
	Rats	TENS	Hind limbs	Decrease	OXT expression	[54]

MA: Manual acupuncture; EA: Electro-acupuncture; ST-36: Zusanli; RD: Rectal distension; CV-12: Zhongwan; NMDA: N-methyl-D-aspartate; TRPV1: Transient receptor potential vanilloid-1; TENS: Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation; OXT: Oxytocin.

Table 3 Clinical trials associated with acupuncture and gastrointestinal Regulation

Trial design	Subjects	Method	Acupoints	Result	Ref.
Randomized controlled trial	Healthy persons administered with mosapride citrate	Manual acupuncture	LI-4 and PC-6	GI motility ↓	[32]
Non-randomized controlled trial	Healthy persons administered with loperamide	Manual acupuncture	LI-4 and PC-6	GI motility ↑	[33]
Non-randomized controlled trial	Healthy persons	Manual acupuncture	LI-4 and PC-6	Intestinal motility -	[34]
Randomized controlled trial	Healthy volunteers	Manual acupuncture	ST-36	GI motility ↑	[21]
Randomized controlled trial	Healthy volunteers	Manual acupuncture	ST-36 and PC-6	Normogastria↓	[31]
				Bradygastria ↑

↑, increase; ↓, decrease; -: No effect. GI: Gastrointestinal; RCT: Randomized controlled trial; LI-4: Hegu; PC-6: Neiguan; ST-36: Zusanli.