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Transcutaneous Electrical Acupoint Stimulation for the Treatment of ADHD

Transcutaneous Electrical Acupoint Stimulation for Treating Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: A Prospective, Randomized, Controlled Trial

Status
Completed
Phases
NA
Study type
Interventional
Source
ClinicalTrials.gov
Registry ID
NCT03917953
Enrollment
78
Registered
2019-04-17
Start date
2019-07-01
Completion date
2020-01-17
Last updated
2021-03-15

For informational purposes only — not medical advice. Sourced from public registries and may not reflect the latest updates. Terms

Conditions

ADHD

Brief summary

RATIONALE: Transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation may improve attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). PURPOSE: This randomized-controlled trial study of treating attention deficit hyperactivity disorder of school-aged children with transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation to see how well it works compared to sham transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation.

Detailed description

OBJECTIVES: Primary To determine whether true transcutaneous electrical acupoint stimulation(TEAS) administered twice weekly for 4 weeks (8 sessions) compared to sham TEAS causes a significant improvement in symptoms of ADHD according to the investigator-rated Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) scores at week 4. Secondary To evaluate the changes from baseline to week 4 of Clinical Global Impressions Scale-Severity of Illness (CGI-S),Conners'Parent Rating Scales-Revised: Short Form (CPRS-R: S) score, Conners'Teacher Rating Scales-Revised: Short Form (CTRS-R: S) score, go/no-go task performances, and the concentration of oxygenated hemoglobin within the prefrontal cortex. OUTLINE: This is a single-center study. Patients are randomized to two treatment arms. Arm I: Patients receive TEAS twice weekly for 4 weeks . Arm II: Patients receive sham TEAS twice weekly for 4 weeks .

Interventions

DEVICETranscutaneous Electrical Acupoint Stimulation

Patients in the experimental group will be treated for 20 min TEAS, twice a week, for a total of 4 weeks of treatment.The same intervention was performed in the sham group (electrode patches were attached at corresponding acupoints without electrical stimulation). Acupoint selection: baihui (GV 20), taichong (LR 3), taixi (KI 3).

Sponsors

Xian Children's Hospital
CollaboratorOTHER_GOV
Shaanxi Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine
CollaboratorOTHER
Air Force Military Medical University, China
CollaboratorOTHER
First Affiliated Hospital Xi'an Jiaotong University
Lead SponsorOTHER

Study design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
TRIPLE (Subject, Caregiver, Outcomes Assessor)

Masking description

Children with ADHD in the 2 groups were treated in separate treatment rooms and blinded on the intervention (i.e., true or sham TEAS). The TEAS operators could not be blinded to the treatment assignments. The data collectors, outcome assessors, and statisticians were blinded to group allocations.

Eligibility

Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
6 Years to 12 Years
Healthy volunteers
No

Inclusion criteria

* Patients must be conform to ADHD clinical diagnostic criteria (DSM-V). * Patients' ages are between 6\ 12 years old. * An informed written consent from parents and participants

Exclusion criteria

* Patients have a history of illness that concomitant with other mental and neurological disorders. * Patients's IQ score are lower than 75. * Patients have had prior TEAS or other acupoints-associated treatment experiences. * Left handedness.

Design outcomes

Primary

MeasureTime frameDescription
the investigator-rated Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) scores4 weeksThe CGI-Improvement scale was used to evaluate the improvement, maintenance, or worsening of subjects' symptoms compared to baseline. The CGI-Improvement Scale includes seven options for scoring: 1 very much improved; 2 much improved; 3 minimally improved; 4 no change; 5 minimally worse; 6 much worse; and 7 very much worse. Clinical response at week 4 was defined as a rating of much or very much improved (1 or 2), which is considered a clinically meaningful response.

Secondary

MeasureTime frameDescription
Clinical Global Impression-Improvement-Severity (CGI-S) score4 weeksThe CGI-S includes seven options for scoring: 1 normal, not at all ill; 2 borderline mentally ill; 3 mildly ill; 4 moderately ill; 5 markedly ill; 6 severely ill; and 7 among the most extremely ill patients.
Conners' Parent Rating Scales-Revised: Short Form (CPRS-R: S) score4 weeksThe CTRS-R:S is a teacher-rated 27-item 4-point Likert rating scale that contains items on ADHD and comorbid conditions (i.e., problems with conduct, emotion, anger control, and anxiety) in the home setting.
Conners' Teacher Rating Scales-Revised: Short Form (CTRS-R: S) score4 weeksThe CTRS-R:S is a teacher-rated 28-item 4-point Likert rating scale that contains items on ADHD and comorbid conditions (i.e., problems with conduct, emotion, anger control, and anxiety) in the school setting.
go/no-go task performances4 weeksThe accuracy (ACC) for go and no-go trials and reaction time (RT) of go trials were computed for each go/no-go block.
the concentration of oxygenated hemoglobin within the prefrontal cortex4 weeksfNIRS was used to monitor the brain response when the participants performed a go/no-go task before and after TEAS or sham TEAS treatment. The ETG-4000 (Hitachi Medical Corporation, Japan) multichannel fNIRS system to measure the relative concentration changes in oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO), with two wavelengths of nearinfrared light (695 and 830 nm). HbO signal is more sensitive to changes in cerebral blood flow than deoxygenated hemoglobin and total hemoglobin signals. Specifically, we used a 3 × 11 multichannel patch that consisted of 17 emitters and 16 detectors arranged alternately at an inter-probe distance of 3 cm forming 52 channels.

Countries

China

Outcome results

None listed

Source: ClinicalTrials.gov · Data processed: Feb 18, 2026