Acupuncture in the Treatment of a Female Patient Suffering from Chronic Schizophrenia and Sleep Disorders

Abstract

Background. The use of acupuncture in the treatment of sleep disorders in patients with chronic schizophrenia is investigated. Case Presentation. We report the case of a 44-year-old female outpatient of German origin who had been suffering from long-term schizophrenia and sleep disorders. The patient was treated with manual acupuncture weekly for 12 weeks, and a psychological assessment was performed before, immediately after, and three months after the acupuncture treatment period. In addition, actiwatch data were collected for 14 days both before and after the acupuncture treatment period. Conclusion. Acupuncture treatment led to a decrease in general psychopathology, less severe sleep problems, and markedly improved cognitive functioning (working memory) in the patient; however, the positive and the negative symptoms remained stable. The actiwatch data revealed a beneficial effect of acupuncture, showing better sleep latency, a trend towards better sleep efficiency, and a decrease in the number of minutes that the patient was awake during the night after acupuncture treatment. In sum, this study showed that acupuncture might be beneficial in the treatment of sleep disorders in patients suffering from chronic schizophrenia, but future, large, randomized (placebo), controlled, clinical trials are needed in order to replicate the present preliminary findings.

Acupuncture as Add-On Treatment of the Positive, Negative, and Cognitive Symptoms of Patients with Schizophrenia: A Systematic Review

“…Finally, the present review shows that positive results have been reported in the literature for the treatment of the co-morbid sleep disorders of patients with schizophrenia [35,[43][44][45]61]. For instance, the following sleep variables, i.e., sleep onset latency, sleep percentage, mean activity level, wake time after sleep onset, mean number of wake episodes, mean wake episode and longest wake episode, have been found to be significantly improved after acupuncture treatment [61].…”

“…As can be seen in Figure 1, our search resulted in 97 articles, of which 38 articles were relevant, but only 26 of those 38 satisfied the inclusion criteria and were, thus, eligible for inclusion in this review. Of the 26, 7 were randomized controlled trials [32][33][34][35][36][37][38], 12 were case studies [39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50], and 7…”

“…In some studies, better results are found on the objective sleep measurements compared to the subjective sleep measurements [61] whereas in other studies, the opposite result is found [45]. In sum, several studies report beneficial effects of acupuncture in the treatment of the sleep disorders in patients with schizophrenia [35,[43][44][45]61]; however, more randomized, controlled trials are needed in order to replicate this finding and to shed light on the question as to whether objective or subjective sleep measurements give more reliable indications of the success of the treatment.…”

“…In most cases, behavioral data on the so-called executive functioning tasks, such as working memory tests, were reported. In a case study, an improved performance in working memory performance immediately after finishing the 12 weeks of acupuncture treatment that remained stable at follow-up, three months later, involving a patient with schizophrenia was reported [44].…”

“…Positive results have been reported for the treatment of co-morbid sleep disorders [35,50]. schizophrenia and co-morbid sleep disorders [43][44][45]. However, those positive effects of acupuncture in the treatment of the co-morbid sleep disorders could not be replicated in a randomized, controlled trial on 40 outpatients with schizophrenia [38].…”