Variability in the Diagnosis and Point Selection for Persons with Frequent Headache by Traditional Chinese Medicine Acupuncturists

Abstract

Headache is a heterogeneous condition represented by a wide variety of TCM diagnoses. There is variability among acupuncturists in the diagnosis of TCM patterns and the selection of acupuncture points for needling. These data suggest, however, that most persons with frequent headache appear to have liver Yang and Qi disharmonies for which needling of Liver 3, Large Intestine 4, and/or Governing Vessel 20 may be appropriate. Further research is needed to determine the extent to which variability in the diagnosis or acupuncture point selection among acupuncturists affects clinical outcomes.

BCQ+: A Body Constitution Questionnaire to Assess Yang-Xu

“…The TCM experts in our study had the chance to revise their opinion through repeated iterations of the Delphi process, and achieved consensus with others. Considering the differences between their educational background and experiences, the TCM experts' opinions regarding the diagnostic criteria may be different and consensus be difficult to achieve [29,30,33]. We therefore decided to keep items with an CVI ≥ 0.7 [34].…”

TCM tongue diagnosis index of early-stage breast cancer

“…Previous studies have been conducted on the issue regarding consistency of TCM diagnosis [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] as well as herbal prescription or treatment, 13,14,16 indicating that inter-and intra-observer agreements are low. The inconsistency of subjective diagnosis and treatment can be improved by the development of validated instruments, such as standard questionnaire for inquiries 5 and manual for guiding treatments.…”

Reliability of Chinese Medicine Diagnostic Variables in the Examination of Patients with Osteoarthritis of the Knee

“…The majority of studies of reliability of CM diagnosis for a variety of clinical conditions have yielded relatively low levels of agreement among practitioners. [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11] Little information is available about where in the diagnostic process the variability exists-at the basic level of data collection or at the stage of synthesizing the data according to various CM theories to arrive at the CM syndrome diagnosis, or both. The current study examined the reliability of the fundamental stage of the diagnostic process-data collection.…”

“…There have been several studies that have investigated the reliability of CM Syndrome diagnosis, in a variety of clinical conditions. [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11] Overall, the majority of studies have indicated that CM Syndrome diagnosis is not particularly reliable. There was no analysis of the reliability of the clinical data collected in these studies; therefore, it is unknown where the inconsistency lies-at the basic level of data collection or in the synthesis of the data to form the Syndrome diagnosis.…”