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Background Acute renal colic caused by urinary calculi (ARCUC) has a considerable impact on the quality of life. Acupuncture might be a potential treatment option. However, the evidence is limited. We will conduct this trial to evaluate the efficacy and safety of acupuncture as adjunctive treatment to diclofenac for ARCUC. Methods/design A total of 80 eligible patients who are diagnosed with urinary stone renal colic will be randomly allocated to the acupuncture group or the sham acupuncture group. Each patient will receive 1 session of acupuncture or sham acupuncture. The primary outcome will be the response rate of patients achieving a reduction of > 50% on visual analog score (VAS) from baseline to 10 min after treatment. Secondary outcomes will include the VAS, remedial analgesia, re-visit and admission rate, blinding assessment, credibility and expectancy, and adverse event. All patients who receive randomization will be included in the intent-to-treat analysis. Discussion The finding of this trial will provide evidence on the efficacy and safety of acupuncture for the treatment of ARCUC. The results of this study will be published in peer-reviewed journals. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov ChiCTR 1900025202. Registered on August 16, 2019.

Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) is the term for a type of non-malignant prostate enlargement that is most often diagnosed in men of middle age and older. Lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) are commonly observed in men afflicted with BPH. Evidence suggests that warm needling therapy could be applied clinically to relieve the LUTS associated with BPH, particularly in China, where experienced practitioners are readily available. In this review, the safety and effects of warm needling therapy are assessed in the context of treatment for LUTS associated with BPH.First, data for relevant randomised controlled trials and the initial periods of randomised cross-over trials will be obtained from four English databases (MEDLINE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, EMBASE, and Allied and Complementary Medicine Database) and six Chinese databases (China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang Database, SinoMed, Chongqing VIP Chinese Science and Technology Periodical Database, China Master's Theses Full-text Database and China Doctoral Dissertations Full-text Database). The primary outcomes analysed in this protocol are improvements in urological symptoms as measured by recognized urological symptom scores, while secondary outcomes include improvement of urine flow rate measures, residual urine volume, nocturia, prostate size, and quality-of-life score. In addition, safety outcomes will be analysed by assessing incidences of adverse events. Two reviewers will independently assess and select studies, extract data and assess the risk of bias. Data synthesis and risk bias assessment will be performed with Review Manager software (version 5.3).This systematic review provides a synthesis to assess the therapeutic efficacy of warm needling therapy for LUTS associated with BPH.The present study will provide a clinically relevant evaluation of the current state of evidence regarding the therapeutic efficacy of warm needling therapy for LUTS associated with BPH.Ethical approval is not required for this review, because private information will not be collected from the included participants. The results of the study will be published in a peer-reviewed journal.PROSPERO CRD42020198360.

Renal colic is described as one of the worst types of pain, and effective analgesia in the shortest possible time is of paramount importance.To examine whether acupuncture, as an adjunctive therapy to analgesics, could accelerate pain relief in patients with acute renal colic.This single-center, sham-controlled, randomized clinical trial was conducted in an emergency department in China between March 2020 and September 2020. Participants with acute renal colic (visual analog scale [VAS] score ≥4) due to urolithiasis were recruited. Data were analyzed from October 2020 to January 2022.After diagnosis and randomization, all patients received 50 mg/2 mL of diclofenac sodium intramuscular injection immediately followed by 30-minute acupuncture or sham acupuncture.The primary outcome was the response rate at 10 minutes after needle manipulation, which was defined as the proportion of participants whose VAS score decreased by at least 50% from baseline. Secondary outcomes included response rates at 0, 5, 15, 20, 30, 45, and 60 minutes, rescue analgesia, and adverse events.A total of 115 participants were screened and 80 participants (66 men [82.5%]; mean [SD] age, 45.8 [13.8] years) were enrolled, consisting of 40 per group. The response rates at 10 minutes were 77.5% (31 of 40) and 10.0% (4 of 40) in the acupuncture and sham acupuncture groups, respectively. The between-group differences were 67.5% (95% CI, 51.5% to 83.4%; P .001). The response rates of acupuncture were also significantly higher than sham acupuncture at 0, 5, 15, 20 and 30 minutes, whereas no significant difference was detected at 45 and 60 minutes. However, there was no difference between the 2 groups in rescue analgesia rate (difference 2.5%; 95% CI -8.8% to 13.2%; P .99). No adverse events occurred during the trial.These findings suggest that acupuncture plus intramuscular injection of diclofenac is safe and provides fast and substantial pain relief for patients with renal colic compared with sham acupuncture in the emergency setting. However, no difference in rescue analgesia was found, possibly because of the ceiling effect caused by subsequent but robust analgesia of diclofenac. Acupuncture can be considered an optional adjunctive therapy in relieving acute renal colic.Chinese Clinical Trial Registry: ChiCTR1900025202.