Research paperEvidence-based (GRADE approach) Korean medicine clinical practice guidelines of manual acupuncture for the treatment of shoulder pain

IntroductionShoulder pain is a common musculoskeletal problem and one of the highest health expenditures in Korea. This article describes the development of evidence-based Korean medicine (KM) clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) for manual acupuncture for the management of shoulder pain.MethodsThe CPG-KM Development Committee was provided with 12 clinical questions on manual acupuncture for the management of shoulder pain. A literature search was then conducted on seven databases (PubMed, Medline, the Cochrane Library, three Korean medical databases and one Chinese medical database).ResultsThe final recommendations were developed by reaching official agreement on the draft using the Delphi method and the CPG-KM for shoulder pain which was approved by The Society of Korean Medicine Rehabilitation. Twelve clinical questions and eleven of the recommendations (grade A (2), B (5), C (2) and GPP (2)) were primarily related to manual acupuncture methods. A manual acupuncture treatment is recommended as grade A, to alleviate pain and improve the range of motion and shoulder joint function of an adult shoulder pain patient. An acupuncture treatment for shoulder pain should simultaneously consider local and distal acupoints.ConclusionThe CPG KM for shoulder pain provides a standard procedure for the treatment process to ensure that a high quality medical service is provided globally to all patients for traditional KM, thereby supporting international traditional medicine research methodology. If additional clinical research is conducted in the future, this CPG can be updated to reflect the most up-to-date evidence.