Acupuncture versus celecoxib
KOA knee pain, knee pain, KOA
This study found no clinical therapeutic efficacy difference in knee pain relief between acupuncture treatment and celecoxib, which further validated the analgesic effect of acupuncture. Celecoxib is the most widely used NSAIDs for the medication of KOA.The neuroimaging results showed that KOA knee pain patients had increased vlPAG rs‐FC with bilateral thalamus compared with HCs. Neuroanatomical studies have found that the thalamus has neural fiber connections with PAG through the thalamus‐PAG pathway,Nevertheless, this study found that celecoxib did not affect vlPAG rs‐FC in KOA patients. It is believed that celecoxib might take action for KOA knee pain relief mainly through the local anti‐inflammatory and analgesic mechanism in the knee joint, with limited involvement of vlPAG DPMS at the supraspinal level. Unlike celecoxib, acupuncture could modulate vlPAG rs‐FC with the right DLPFC and angular for knee pain relief in KOA patients. Research has shown that the DLPFC is directly connected to PAG through DLPFC‐thalamus‐PAG/DLPFC‐ACC‐thalamus‐PAG pathway,