Determining the Efficacy and Safety of Acupuncture for the Preventive Treatment of Menstrual Migraine: A Protocol for a PRISMA-Compliant Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Background

Menstrual migraine (MM), as a common type of headache related to women’s menstrual cycle, currently available treatments do not produce sufficient effectiveness, making it remains difficult to manage. Although acupuncture may be an effective treatment for MM, there is a lack of convincing evidence to recommend acupuncture to patients with MM until more solid evidence is produced. Therefore, the purpose of our systematic review (SR) and meta-analysis protocol is to synthesize up-to-date evidence regarding the clinical efficacy and safety of acupuncture on MM.

Methods

To find qualifying RCTs, nine databases will be searched. RevMan 5.3 will be used to combine the retrieved data for meta-analyses. The Cochrane risk of bias instrument will be used to assess the methodological quality of each included trial. The strength and certainty of the evidence will be evaluated using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) system. Additionally, we will undertake sensitivity analyses, publication bias, and subgroup analyses if available.

Discussion

Our SR and meta-analysis protocol will contribute to determining acupuncture’s therapeutic effect and safety in the preventive treatment of MM. Based on the up-to-date evidence produced by the subsequent SR and meta-analysis, informed treatment decisions will be made by patients, physicians and policy makers.

Keywords:

• menstrual migraine
• acupuncture
• systematic review
• meta-analysis

Author Contributions

All authors contributed significantly to the work that was published, whether it be in the conception, study design, implementation, data collection, analysis, and interpretation, or all of these areas. They also all participated in drafting, revising, or critically evaluating the article, gave their final approval for the version that would be published, agreed on the journal to which the article has been submitted, and agreed to be responsible for all aspects of the work.

Disclosure

Qiqi Wu, Jiawei Wang, and Xiaoqi Lin are co-first authors for this study. The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by Zhejiang Provincial Famous Traditional Chinese Medicine Experts Inheritance Studio Construction Project (grant number: GZS2021027), the 2021 Special Project for Modernization of Chinese Medicine in Zhejiang Province (grant number: 2021ZX010), the hospital project of the Third Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical University (grant number: ZS21ZA01) and the Zhejiang Province Public Welfare Technology Application Research (grant number: LTGY23H270003).