Huiying Wang, In-Seon Lee, Christoph Braun, Paul Enck. J Neurogastroenterol Motil 1999;0:. http://dx.doi.org/10.5056/jnm16018

The antioxidant activities and the determined major components of six popular and commercially available herb essential oils, including lavender (Lavendular angustifolia), peppermint (Mentha piperita), rosemary (Rosmarius officinalis), lemon (Citrus limon), grapefruit (Citrus paradise), and frankincense (Boswellia carteri), were compared. The essential oils were analysed by GC–MS and their antioxidant activities were determined by testing free radical-scavenging capacity and lipid peroxidation in the linoleic acid system. The major components of the essential oils of lavender, peppermint, rosemary, lemon, grapefruit, and frankincense were linalyl acetate (28.2%), menthol (33.4%), 1,8-cineole (46.1%), limonene (64.5 and 94.2%), and p-menth-2-en-ol (34.5%), respectively. The highest DPPH radical-scavenging activity was obtained by the lavender essential oil and limonene, with RC₅₀ values of 2.1 ± 0.23% and 2.1 ± 0.04%, respectively. Radical-scavenging activity against the ABTS radical was highest in peppermint essential oil (1.6 ± 0.09). Lavender oil was most effective for inhibiting linoleic acid peroxidation after 10 days.

Objective: A bibliometric approach using quantitative analytical methods was applied to explore the development of research investigating acupuncture for the treatment of pain. This study also evaluated the current status of acupuncture analgesia with a visualization analysis of journal articles. Methods: Articles on acupuncture for pain control that were published from 2000 to 2019 were retrieved from the Web of Science database. Extracted records were analyzed in terms of year of publication, country, journal, research area, authors, and organizational affiliations. The VOSviewer program was used to visualize trends in research on acupuncture for pain control. Results: Analyses of 4595 original and review articles revealed that the total number of publications has continually increased over the last 20 years. The country producing the most articles in this field was the United States, followed by China and South Korea. A network analysis based on the cooccurrence of keywords revealed the following three major types of studies: clinical studies, pain management studies, and mechanism studies. Conclusion: The present study evaluated research on acupuncture for pain control using bibliometric methods and revealed current trends in acupuncture analgesia research, as well as potential future hot spots of research in this field.

Background/Aims. Despite the wide use of acupuncture for the management of visceral pain and the growing interest in the pathophysiology of visceral pain, there is no conclusive elucidation of the mechanisms behind the effects of acupuncture on visceral pain. This systematic review aims to provide an integrative understanding of the treatment mechanism of acupuncture for visceral pain. Methods. Electronic and hand searches were conducted to identify studies that involved visceral pain and acupuncture. Results. We retrieved 192 articles, out of which 46 studies were included in our review. The results of our review demonstrated that visceral pain behaviors were significantly alleviated in response to acupuncture treatment in groups treated with this intervention compared to in sham acupuncture or no-treatment groups. Changes in the concentrations of β-endorphin, epinephrine, cortisol, and prostaglandin E2 in plasma, the levels of c-Fos, substance P, corticotropin-releasing hormone, P2X3, acetylcholinesterase (AchE), N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors, and serotonin in the gut/spinal cord, and the neuronal activity of the thalamus were associated with acupuncture treatment in visceral pain. Conclusions. Acupuncture reduced visceral pain behavior and induced significant changes in neuronal activity as well as in the levels of pain/inflammation-related cytokines and neurotransmitters in the brain-gut axis. Further researches on the thalamus and on a standard animal model are warranted to improve our knowledge on the mechanism of acupuncture that facilitates visceral pain modulation.