Comparison of laser acupuncture and metoclopramide in PONV prevention in children

Abstract

Laser acupuncture is equally effective as metoclopramide in preventing PONV in children.

Stimulation of the wrist acupuncture point P6 for preventing postoperative nausea and vomiting

“…Most trials recruited healthy adults undergoing elective surgery. Seven trials recruited children (Butkovic 2005;Lewis 1991;Rusy 2002;Schlager 1998;Shenkman 1999;Wang 2002;Yentis 1992). One trial recruited both children and adults (Amir 2007).…”

“…There were 10 types of P6 acupoint stimulation: needle acupuncture (Dundee 1986;Dundee 1989;Sharma 2007;Streitberger 2004;Yentis 1992); infiltration of dextrose (Tavlan 1996;Wang 2002;Yang 1993); semipermanent needles (Andrzejowski 1996); electrical stimulation of needles (Amir 2007;Dundee 1989;Ho 1989;Rusy 2002); transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (Fassoulaki 1993;Gan 2004;Habib 2006;Ho 1989); laser stimulation (Butkovic 2005;Schlager 1998); an acu-stimulation device (White 2002;Zarate 2001); and acupressure (Agarwal 2000;Agarwal 2002;Alkaissi 1999;Alkaissi 2002;Allen 1994;Barsoum 1990;Duggal 1998;Ferrara-Love 1996;Gieron 1993;Harmon 1999;Harmon 2000;Ho 1996;Klein 2004;Lewis 1991;Samad 2003;Schultz 2003;Turgut 2007). Two studies used conventional peripheral nerve stimulation (Arnberger 2007;Liu 2008).…”

“…P6 stimulation was compared with five antiemetic drugs: metoclopramide (Butkovic 2005;Dundee 1989); cyclizine (Dundee 1989); prochlorperazine (Barsoum 1990;Ho 1989); droperidol (Schultz 2003;Wang 2002;Yang 1993;Yentis 1992); and ondansetron (Agarwal 2002;Gan 2004;Misra 2005;Sharma 2007;Tavlan 1996;White 2002).…”

“…The outcome assessor was not blinded in two studies (Gieron 1993;Sharma 2007). Twelve trials did not report all four outcomes: postoperative nausea, postoperative vomiting, rescue antiemetic drugs, and adverse events in their studies (Alkaissi 1999;Allen 1994;Barsoum 1990;Butkovic 2005;Fassoulaki 1993;Ferrara-Love 1996;Habib 2006;Harmon 2000;Ho 1989;Lewis 1991;Schultz 2003;Yang 1993). All studies except one (Dundee 1989) reported the betweengroup comparisons of baseline characteristics.…”

“…For example, P6 acupoint stimulation significantly reduced the risk of PONV in some studies (Amir 2007;Butkovic 2005;Ho 1996;Rusy 2002;Turgut 2007;Wang 2002) but not in others (Agarwal 2000;Allen 1994;Barsoum 1990;Misra 2005;Shenkman 1999). One systematic review (Vickers 1996), using a 'vote counting' approach, suggested that acupuncture may not be effective in the prevention of PONV.…”