PURPOSE: To investigate the efficacy of acupuncture combined with medication in the treatment of sciatica using a systematic review approach. METHODS: Databases such as CNKI, Wanfang database, VIP, and PubMed were searched using keywords which include: acupuncture, electro-acupuncture, millimeters, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory analgesic drugs, corticosteroids, sciatica, and vitamins, to identify relevant literature on the treatment of sciatica using acupuncture and moxibustion combined with drugs. The review adopted the Review Manager 5.3 software for meta-analysis of all data. RESULTS: The combined effect size RR 1.12, Z 3.5 (p < 0.05), 95% CI (1.05 to 1.20) in the forest plot of overall effectiveness rate. Also, combined diamond of the effective outcome in the forest plot was located on the right side of the midline, the combined effect size STD -1.25, Z 7.1 (p < 0.00001), 95% CI (-1.59 to -0.90) in the forest plot of VAS scores. CONCLUSIONS: acupuncture combined with medication treatment reduces pain, and improves total effectiveness and cure rate of sciatica treatment. The exact efficacy still needs to be confirmed by large-scale and multi-center randomized controlled trials (RCT).

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