Objective: To assess the effectiveness and safety of various types of acupuncture in treatment of premenstrual syndrome (PMS).
Methods: Search Chinese and English databases of the Cochrane Library, CENTRAL, MEDLINE, EMBASE, CBM, CNKI and reference lists of correlative academic conference proceedings.
Results: Eight controlled studies involving 807 women (range, 61-225) meeting the enrolled criteria. Among them 7 studies showed that therapeutic effects of acupuncture were superior to other methods (i. e. Western medicine or Chinese herbs).
Conclusion: Acupuncture can effectively treat PMS. However, more randomized controlled trials are needed to assess the effectiveness and adverse-effect of acupuncture for treatment of PMS.