Effects of Acupuncture at Neiguan in Neural Activity of Related Brain Regions: A Resting-State fMRI Study in Anxiety

Chunlin Li,1 Yuangeng Wang,2 Baopeng Li,3 Shanshan Su4 1Department of Encephalopathy, Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jinan, People’s Republic of China; 2First College of Clinical Medicine, Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jinan, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Radiology, Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jinan, People’s Republic of China; 4Department of Nephrology, Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jinan, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Chunlin Li, Department of Encephalopathy, Affiliated Hospital of Shandong University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, No. 16369 Jingshi Road, Jinan, People’s Republic of China, Tel +86 137 91118881, Email 37673261@qq.comBackground: Acupuncture of PC6 points has the effects of calming, tranquilizing, regulating qi, and relieving pain and has been clinically found to alleviate anxiety disorders. To explore the mechanism of improvement at the Neiguan point acupuncture in anxiety patients, we used fMRI to observe the changes in brain function in patients with immediate anxiety before and after acupuncture at the Neiguan point.Subjects and Methods: The experiment followed the principle of randomized, single-blind design. Twenty-four anxiety volunteers (14 males and 10 females, 20– 35 years old) were divided randomly into two groups: a group of acupuncture at Neiguan and a group of acupuncture at non-acupoint. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was applied to measure brain activity pre- and post-acupuncture. The amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (ALFF) and seed-based functional connectivity (FC) was used to analyze the activity and network of brain regions. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS 21.0 and REST 1.8 software.Results: ALFF results revealed that post-acupuncture at Neiguan increased the activity of the left parahippocampal gyrus, fusiform gyrus, and right superior temporal gyrus and ...