Liu F, et al. – The efficacy and safety of acupotomy therapy were evaluated in chronic nonspecific neck pain. For chronic nonspecific neck pain, acupotomy therapy could be beneficial. Future, more rigorously designed clinical trials, adequate adverse events, and follow–up project were recommended to strengthen the supportive evidence.

• In this study, 6 computerised databases were searched.
• The clinicians included randomized controlled trials incorporating acupotomy therapy alone or combined with other conventional treatments for chronic nonspecific neck pain.
• According to Cochrane Reviews’ Handbook (5.1), 2 reviewers screened each literature and extracted data independently.
• For the meta-analysis, the Cochrane Collaboration’s RevMan 5.3 software was applied.

• The clinicians enrolled 10 trials involving 433 patients.
• The pooled analysis revealed that acupotomy therapy demonstrated a significant improving short-term and long-term effect on effective rate and cure rate.
• Meta-analysis showed that in restoring cervical lordosis and debasing VAS score, acupotomy therapy group was superior to control group.
• The outcome of continuous data did not support statistical significance of acupotomy therapy in adjusting clinical symptom score.
• Compared to control group, acupotomy group did not reveal obvious superiority for adverse events.