Electro-acupuncture in addition to conventional anaesthesia delivered during total knee replacement procedures, improves functional recovery, pain, circulation and swelling. In a Chinese trial of 200 participants, patients were randomly allocated to one of four groups: intravenous analgesia, femoral nerve block analgesia, or each of the foregoing plus electro-acupuncture.
Electro-acupuncture plus femoral nerve block was associated with a significantly lower incidence of deep vein thrombosis, compared with the other three groups. Seven days after surgery, blood flow in the two electro-acupuncture groups was significantly better than in the other two groups. With less post-operative pain, the electro-acupuncture plus femoral nerve block group, was able to participate in rehabilitation exercises sooner.
(The Preventive Effect of Computed Tomography Image-Guided Electroacupuncture Combined with Continuous Femoral Nerve Block on Deep Vein Thrombosis After Total Knee Arthroplasty Based on an Adaptive Algorithm. World Neurosurgery, May 2021.)