The Effect of Auricular Press Needle on Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) and Short Form (SF-12) Scores in Chronic Pain With Depression Symptoms

Chronic pain is a medical and social problem that can significantly impact the quality of life. Chronic pain is an important risk factor in the development of depression. It is shown by the significantly higher prevalence of depression in individuals who experience chronic pain (20-80%). Apart from that, chronic pain and depression also have a close relationship in the development of disease and mutually influence the severity of each condition. To reduce the cost of pain management from a pharmacological perspective and its use in the long term, it is necessary to consider other non-pharmacological treatment methods that have good therapeutic effects with minimal side effects. Acupuncture has become a non-pharmacological therapy option that has proven its effectiveness and safety in treating chronic pain in depressed patients. Previous literature has reported the effectiveness of acupuncture therapy, especially auricular acupuncture in treating pain. Auricular acupuncture therapy using press needles is quite easy to apply, fast, and can provide continuous stimulation with minimal side effects. This study aimed to assess the effectiveness of the auricular needle press in chronic pain with depressive symptoms. This study was a double-blinded randomized clinical trial and was carried out on outpatients at Dr. Cipto Mangunkusumo National General Hospital Jakarta and Soerojo Hospital Magelang. This is also a collaborative study between the medical acupuncture department and the psychiatry department. This study includes 60 participants who will be randomly allocated into 2 groups, the press needle and sham press needle groups. The press needles will be placed at 6 auricular points bilaterally, which are MA-TF1 Shenmen, MA-IC7 Heart, and MA-IT1 Cingulate gyrus. The outcomes that will be assessed in this study are pain intensity using the visual analog scale (VAS) and quality of life using the short form-12 (SF-12) as well as time-to-event achievement in the form of a decrease in the VAS score \>= 14 mm.