World Federation of Acupuncture-Moxibustion Societies(WFAS)Clinical Practice Guidelines on Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Female Urinary Incontinence recommendation summaries

Urinary incontinence(UI)is common in women and affects the quality of life in female patients severely.But the clinical consideration and treatment are insufficient.Acupuncture and-moxibustion has been proposed as a potentially effective intervention for female UI.Hence,the World Federation of Acupuncturemoxibustion Societies(WFAS)have initiated a project to develop the clinical practice guideline(CPG)on acupuncture and moxibustion for female UI towards global acupuncture practitioners.The CPG was developed according to the Grades of Recommendation,Assessment,Development,and Evaluation(GRADE)methodology,referring to the principles of the World Health Organization Handbook for Guideline Development.During the development of the CPG,the guideline development group(GDG)played an important role,which is composed of multi-national and multi-disciplinary experts.The clinical questions,recommendations and therapeutic protocols were all formulated by GDG using the modified Delphi method and basing on the results of the latest systematic review.This article focuses on the recommendations in the CPG.The CPG contains ten recommendations for ten clinical questions,including nine conditional recommendations for the intervention,one conditional recommendations for either the intervention or the comparison.The CPG also provides one conventional filiform needle therapy protocol,two deep puncturing stimulation on lumbosacral acupoints therapy protocols,and four moxibustion therapy protocols,extracted from the included clinical evidence of this CPG.

Clinical practice guideline for acupuncture and moxibustion: Female urinary incontinence

Urinary incontinence (UI) is a common problem worldwide.It has a major impact on physical and social activities and interpersonal relationships.UI is common in women,but is under-reported and undertreated.It affects the quality of life of female patients severely.Acupuncture and moxibustion have been proposed as potentially effective interventions for female UI.Hence,for the benefit of acupuncture practitioners around the world,the World Federation of Acupuncture-moxibustion Societies initiated a project to develop a clinical practice guideline (CPG) for the use of acupuncture and moxibustion to treat female UI.This CPG was developed according to the Grading of Recommendations Assessment,Development,and Evaluation (GRADE) methodology,referring to the principles of the World Health Organization Handbook for Guideline Development.During the development of the CPG,the guideline development group (GDG) played an important role.The clinical questions,recommendations and therapeutic protocols were all formulated by GDG using the modified Delphi method.This CPG contains ten recommendations about the use of acupuncture and moxibustion interventions for ten clinical questions,which include nine conditional recommendations for the intervention and one conditional recommendation for either the intervention or the comparison.This CPG also provides one protocol for conventional filiform needle therapy,two therapy protocols for deep needling stimulation on lumbosacral acupoints,and four moxibustion therapy protocols,based on the protocols presented in randomized controlled trials reviewed by the GDG.

Clinical practice guideline for acupuncture and moxibustion:Allergic rhinitis

Acupuncture is one of the most effective complementary therapies for allergic rhinitis(AR)and has been recommended by several clinical practice guidelines(CPGs)for AR.However,these CPGs mentioned acupuncture without making recommendations for clinical implementation and therapeutic protocols,therefore limiting the applicability of acupuncture therapies for AR.Hence,for the benefit of acupuncture practitioners around the world,the World Federation of Acupuncture-moxibustion Societies have initiated a project to develop the CPG for the use of acupuncture and moxibustion to treat AR.This CPG was developed according to the Grading of Recommendations Assessment,Development,and Evaluation(GRADE)methodology,referring to the principles of the World Health Organization Handbook for Guideline Development.During the development of the CPG,the guideline development group(GDG)played an important role.The clinical questions,recommendations and therapeutic protocols were all formulated by the GDG using the modified Delphi method.The CPG contains recommendations for 15 clinical questions about the use of acupuncture and moxibustion interventions.These include one strong recommendation for the intervention based on high-quality evidence,three conditional recommendations for either the intervention or standard care,and 11 conditional recommendations for the intervention based on very low quality of evidence.The CPG also provides one filiform needle acupuncture protocol and five moxibustion protocols extracted based on the protocols presented in randomized controlled trials reviewed by the GDG.

World Federation of Acupuncture-Moxibustion Societies(WFAS)Clinical Practice Guideline on Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Allergic Rhinitis recommendation summaries

Clinical Practice Guideline on Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Allergic Rhinitis was revised and released by the Standards Working Committee of World Federation of Acupuncture-Moxibustion Societies(WFAS)on October 9,2023.This is the first clinical practice guideline(CPG)on acupuncture and moxibustion for allergic rhinitis approved by an international academic organization,which provides evidence-based recommendations and the practical therapeutic protocols for acupuncture practitioners globally.This CPG was developed by following Grades of Recommendation,Assessment,Development,and Evaluation(GRADE)methodology,and the principles of the World Health Organization Handbook for Guideline Development.The members in the guideline development group(GDG)were from different countries,with different professions,and they played a critical role in the development of clinical questions,recommendations,and therapeutic protocols.Recommendations are the core of a CPG and the direct answers to clinical questions,due to which this article focuses on the recommendations of this CPG.The recommendations were developed by using the modified Delphi method and the GRADE grid rules,based on the updated systematic reviews of clinical evidence.A total of 15 recommendations for 15 clinical questions were developed in this CPG,including one strong recommendation for intervention based on high-quality evidence,three conditional recommendations for either the intervention or the comparison based on very low quality of evidence,and 11 conditional recommendations for the intervention based on very low quality of evidence.

Full process of recommendation formulation for clinical practice guidelines:Taking World Federation of Acupuncture-Moxibustion Societies Clinical Practice Guideline on Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Allergic Rhinitis as an example

The formulation of recommendations is a crucial step in the development of clinical practice guidelines,which requires tools provided by the GRADE methodology.These tools include the evidence quality assessment tool,the evidence summary tool,and the evidence-to-decision(EtD)framework.Although there is a methodologically guided standard pathway for formulating recommendations in clinical practice guidelines,it remains unclear how to translate this theoretical pathway into the practical process for formulating recommendations and what the specific steps in this process entail.Therefore,this paper takes the World Federation of Acupuncture-Moxibustion Societies Clinical Practice Guidelines on Acupuncture and Moxibustion:Allergic Rhinitis as an example to detail the full process of formulating recommendations and summaries it into a three-step method.Step one:Collect original materials from different sources to create EtD table.Step two:Distribute and collect EtD table,and preliminarily gather the recommendation voting results.Step three:Organize"salami-slicing pattern"guideline development group consensus meeting to formulate recommendations.The three-step method for formulating recommendations in clinical practice guidelines fully utilizes the GRADE EtD table to provide guideline development group with decision-making foundation and reference from multiple dimensions,including the importance of clinical questions,balance of benefits and harms,quality of evidence,resource required,values and preferences,health equity,acceptability,and feasibility.This approach enhances the scientific and practical nature of guideline recommendations.This paper provides a standard operating procedure to formulate recommendations for the incoming clinical practice guidelines,which aims to establish a standard pathway for the formulation of acupuncture clinical practice guideline recommendations.