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Acupuncture and Knee Osteoarthritis
TO THE EDITOR:
Scharf and colleagues (1) reported that the addition of traditional Chinese acupuncture (TCA) was superior to conservative therapy but not to sham acupuncture for osteoarthritis of the knee. They suggest that “because complete blinding was impossible, this study does not allow us to determine whether the observed effectiveness of TCA and sham acupuncture was due to placebo effects, intensity of provider contact, or a physiologic effect of needling.” However, 2 related points need to be emphasized.
First, either placebo effects or …
