OBJECTIVETo assess the clinical efficacy of acupuncture pretreatment for the prevention of stroke based on promoting the circulation of the Governor Vessel and regulating mentality, and explore its effect mechanism.

METHODSSeventy cases of transient ischemic attack (TIA) were randomized into an acupuncture group (35 cases) and a western medicine group (35 cases). In the acupuncture group, acupuncture therapy of promoting the circulation of the Governor Vessel and regulating mentality was applied at Yaoyangguan (GV 3), Mingmen (GV 4), Zhiyang (GV 9), Shenzhu (GV 12), Dazhui (GV 14), Yamen (GV 15), Fengfu (GV 16), Baihui (GV 20) and Neck-Jiaji (EX-B 2). Acupuncture was given 6 times a week, at the interval of one day between two weeks. Totally, 21 days of treatment were taken as a session. In the western medicine group, aspirin enteric coated tablets were prescribed, 25 mg/tablet, 100 mg/day, once a night for oral administration, and 21 days of medication were taken as 1 session. There were 3 days at the interval between two sessions in each group and totally 2 sessions were required. Transcranial Doppler (TCD) was adopted before treatment and in two sessions of treatment to observe, mean flow velocity (Vm) of middle cerebral artery (MCA), vertebral artery (VA), basilar arte ry (BA) and pulsatility index (PI). The standard of the efficacy assessment of stroke aura was taken as the main efficacy index in the assessment of theraputic effect, the adverse reaction was observed.

RESULTS1In TIA, MCA blood flow was accelerated in internal carotid system, and BA blood flow was accelerated in vertebral-basilar artery system. The treatments in the two groups enabled the blood flow in the responsible blood vessels slow down and the results in the acupuncture group L(60. 54+/-11.76)cm/s, (36. 17+/-8. 65)cm/s] were better than those in the western medicine group [(72. 34+/-9. 15)cm/s,(65. 23 +/-8. 99)cm/s] (P0. 05).

CONCLUSIONAcupuncture intervention based on promoting the circulation of the Governor Vessel and regulating mentality achieves the superior efficacy on TIA and less adverse reactions as compared with aspirin. The effect mechanism is related potentially to the improvement of cerebral vascular hemodynamic.