NCT04242030

The Microcirculatory Characteristics of the Heart and Lung Meridians: A Study of COPD Patients and Healthy Adults

• Status: Unknown
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 120 (estimated)
• Sponsor: Zhejiang Chinese Medical University · Other Government
• Sex: All
• Age: 20 Years – 75 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

Although some important progresses were made in the field of the meridian research, no breakthroughs have been achieved. Besides,there are some problems in meridian researches. The majority of the existing studies involve lots of subjective assessments for meridian phenomena. In addition, few studies have investigated the site specificity between two specific meridians.Therefore, this study is designed to detect the microcirculatory characteristics of meridian phenomena by using an objective assessment tool and investigate the site specificity for the meridian-visceral association and surface-surface association between two specific meridians.

Detailed description

The Lung and Heart meridians are chosen as two specific studied meridians. 120 participants will be enrolled and divided into the healthy control group, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) group and healthy intervention group. Laser doppler flowmetry (LDF) will be used to assess the microcirculatory characteristics of meridian phenomena for the Heart and Lung meridians. The site specificity for the meridian-visceral association will be investigated by comparing the microcirculatory difference between the Heart and Lung meridians in the healthy control group and COPD group. Besides, participants in the healthy intervention group will receive two sessions of moxibustion in the Heart meridian and Lung meridian respectively to explore the site specificity for the surface-surface association.

Conditions

• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Moxibustion	Two sessions of moxibustion will be performed in the Heart meridian and Lung meridian successively. Intervention in the Heart meridian: moxibustion will be performed above Shaohai (HT3) for 15 minutes. During moxibustion, the probes of laser doppler flowmetry will detect the microcirculatory characteristics of three measuring sites, which include the midpoint of the Heart meridian along the left forearm, Chize (LU5) of the Lung meridian, and the midpoint of the Lung meridian along the left forearm. Intervention in the Lung meridian: moxibustion will be performed above Chize (LU5) for 15 minutes. During moxibustion, the probes of laser doppler flowmetry will detect the microcirculatory characteristics of three measuring sites, which include the midpoint of the Lung meridian along the left forearm, Shaohai (HT3) of the Heart meridian, and the midpoint of the Heart meridian along the left forearm.
DEVICE	Laser doppler flowmetry	Laser doppler flowmetry will be used to detect the microcirculatory characteristics of meridian phenomena for the Heart meridian and Lung meridians.

Timeline

• Start date: 2020-02-01
• Primary completion: 2020-12-01
• Completion: 2021-12-01
• First posted: 2020-01-27
• Last updated: 2020-01-30

Locations

1 site across 1 country: China