OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the analgesic effect of acupuncture for needle electromyography and to validate a sham acupuncture needle. DESIGN: Randomized, double-blinded, controlled study. SETTING: University-based electrodiagnostics laboratory. PARTICIPANTS: Fifty-one subjects referred for electrodiagnostic evaluation. INTERVENTIONS: Before the electromyography examination, either real acupuncture needles or telescopic sham needles were applied. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Visual analog scale of pain and unpleasantness after 3 muscles were examined with electromyography. Pretest pain was subtracted to give a measurement of pain attributable to the electromyography. Subjects were asked which needle they thought they had received. RESULTS: Twenty-six subjects were randomized to the treatment group and 25 to the sham group. Pain in the treatment group (-0.96) was less than in the control group (9.68), but it was not statistically significant (p = 0.13). Post hoc analysis, excluding 5 subjects known to have been treated by the novice acupuncturist, showed a significant difference of 14.4mm (p = 0.02). The proportion of subjects who thought they received real needles in the acupuncture group (69%) did not differ from the proportion in the control group (48%) (p = 0.13). CONCLUSIONS: Acupuncture may represent an effective form of analgesia for electromyography. This is the first study to suggest independently the telescopic sham acupuncture needle as an effective control.

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