Interventional Study to Evaluate Efficacy of Acupuncture for Treating Sciatica Pain Inderjit Singh1 , Salil Dube2 , Suryamani Pandey3 , Neha Dhingra4 ORIGINAL RESEARCH ABSTRACT Introduction: Low back pain has a profound impact both directly and indirectly on individuals. It is estimated that 60% to 80% of any population will experience low back pain at some point in their lives. There are number of causes for low back pain and Sciatica is one of them. Study aimed to assess the efficacy of Acupuncture for the management of Sciatica pain. Material and Methods: This study was conducted among 200 patients attending the Outdoor Patient department at Dr D.N. Kotnis Health and Education Center. With each subject a prior informed and written consent was obtained. A predesigned and pretested proforma was used to collect the socio demographic profile. Severity of Pain was measured with the help of Likert Scale whereas the reading on Likert scale was taken at the time of first visit and last visit of patients for comparison of pain. Data was first entered into MS excel sheet and then was exported to SPSS version 20.0 for appropriate analysis. Results: Wilcoxon signed rank test was applied to determine the efficacy of the treatment on reducing the pain, further it was observed that the effect of the treatment was statistically significant Acupuncture therapy for chronic low back pain: protocol of a prospective, multi-center, registry study Xuqiang Wei1 , Baoyan Liu2 , Liyun He2 , Xingyue Yang3 , Jincao Zhou4 , Hong Zhao4*† and Jia Liu2*† Abstract Objective: Acupuncture therapy for chronic low back pain (CLBP) has received increasing attention. Nevertheless, the evidence of efficacy and safety of random controlled trials (RCTs) remains controversial. Acupuncture as a complex intervention influenced by many factors, its effectiveness in treating chronic low back pain in the real world is unknown. We will develop a network-based registry study to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of acupuncture for the treatment of chronic low back pain and explore key factors affecting efficacy in the real world. Methods: A prospective, multi-center and dynamic registry study. All acupuncture related information will be collected through a high-quality structured network platform. Patients with CLBP included in the study met the following criteria: age from 16 to 80 years, using acupuncture as a main therapy and voluntarily signing the informed consent. At least 2000 patients, 27 acupuncturist, and 9 medical centers will be recruited under actual clinical settings at the first stage. Numeric rating scale (NRS), Oswestry Disability Index (ODI) and Effective rate will be measured in pain and functional disability assessment, respectively, as the primary outcome. Evaluation index will be collected at the baseline and follow-up in 1, 4, 12 weeks after the last visit. Hierarchical models and regression analysis will be used to explore the key factors affecting acupuncture effectiveness. Effects between propensity matching groups (Traditional Chinese acupuncture style vs Microacupuncture style, Local acupoint selection vs Non-local acupoint selection, Single Acupuncture vs Combined therapy) will be compared. Discussion: This study will be conducted based on the characteristics of acupuncture therapy in the “Real World”. Fundamental factors affecting the clinical effectiveness of acupuncture and the preferred acupuncture regimen in the treatment of CLBP will be identified. Reliable acupuncture evidence for the treatment of CLBP through the registry will be a significant supplement to the RCTs. Trial registration: Chinese Clinical Trial Registry, ChiCTR-OOC-17010751 and Acupuncture-Moxibustion Clinical Trial Registry, AMCTR-OOO-17000045. Registered date on 3 December 2016. Keywords: Acupuncture, Registry, Chronic low back pain, Real-world, Protocol © The Author(s). 2019 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. * Correspondence: hongzhaojournal@163.com; marie_liujia@sina.cn † Hong Zhao and Jia Liu contributed equally to this work. 4 Institute of Acupuncture and Moxibustion, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, No.16 Dongzhimen inside south St. Dongchen District, Beijing 100700, People’s Republic of China 2 Institute of Basic Research in Clinical Medicine, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, No.16 Dongzhimen