A Study On The Clinical Efficacy Of Guiding Fire To Origin With Moxibustion In Combination With Acupuncture In The Treatment Of Primary Insomnia And Its Impact On Patients’ Serum γ-aminobutyric Acid

Objective:This thesis aims to study the clinical curative effect of guiding fire to origin with moxibustion in the treatment of primary insomnia (PI). By comparing patients’serum y-aminobutyric acid (GABA) levels before and after the treatment, the study attempts to explore the possible mechanism that is at work in adjusting PI patients’sleep in this therapy.Methods:72 qualified patients with primary insomnia were randomly divided in to 2 groups with each containing 36 patients. Patients in the first group (experiment group) were treated with acupuncture combined with moxibustion on yongquan acupoint, while the second group (control group) were treated only with acupuncture. The major acupoints for acupuncture in both groups included yintang acupoint, sishencong acupoint, anmian acupoint, shenmen acupoint, zhaohai acupoint, and shenmai acupoint. After that, comparison was made between the experiment group and the control group in terms of patients’GABA level change before and after the treatment. During this process, patients’Pittsburgh sleep quality index (PSQI) and their clinical symptoms were also observed not only before and immediately after the treatment, but also in the follow-up visit which was one month after the treatment, so as to analyze the correlation between patients’serum GABA level and their PSQI before the treatment.Results:1. Good curative effects were observed for both groups both immediately after and one month after the treatment; The total effective rate of the experiment group and the control group immediately after the treatment were 94.44% and 75.00% respectively; while one month after the treatment, the total effective rate fell to 63.89% for the experiment group and 36.11% for the control group; The clinical curative effect of the two groups showed difference both immediately after and one month after the treatment (P<0.05), with the experiment group doing better than the control group(P<0.05).2. The PSQI score of the experiment group was lower than that of the control group both immediately after and one month after the treatment(P<0.01), which indicates that the control group had a worse sleep than the experiment one.3. After the treatment, the serum GABA levels of the two groups both increased, with patients’serum GABA level of the experiment group, which is higher than that of the control group. This indicates that the increase of serum GABA level in the experiment group was more remarkable than the control group (P<0.05).4. There is a negative correlation between patients’serum GAB A level before the treatment and any one of the following scores:PSQI score, sleep quality factor score, sleep efficiency factor score, hypnotic drug factor score, and daytime function factor score (P<0.05 or P<0.01).Conclusion:1. The clinical curative effect of guiding fire to origin with moxibustion in combination with acupuncture was significant in the treatment of PI.2. The curative mechanism of this therapy may be related to GABA level adjustment.3. The therapy can noticeably improve patients’ sleep quality, sleep efficiency and their working state during the day.