Background: This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of acupuncture combined with Chinese herbal medicine in the treatment of gastric ulcers (GU) through a meta-analysis. Methods: A comprehensive search was conducted in Chinese databases (CNKI, VIP, and Wanfang) and international databases (PubMed, Embase, and the Cochrane Library) to identify available randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published from the inception of each database through January 2025. The primary outcomes considered included overall efficacy rate, Helicobacter pylori (Hp) eradication rate, recurrence rate, gastrin levels, and adverse events. The quality of each included study was assessed using the Cochrane Collaboration’s Risk of Bias Tool, and data were analyzed using RevMan 5.3 software. Results: A total of 1288 articles were initially identified, of which 17 RCTs involving 1632 patients were ultimately included. The meta-analysis demonstrated that acupuncture combined with Chinese herbal medicine was superior to non-acupuncture combined with Chinese herbal medicine in terms of clinical efficacy (OR = 4.83, 95% confidence intervals CI = 3.36–6.93, P < .00001), Hp eradication rate (OR = 3.94, 95% CI = 2.35–6.6, P < .00001), recurrence rate (OR = 0.19, 95% CI = 0.1–0.35, P < .00001), and gastrin levels (MD = −18.39, 95% CI = −20.68 to −16.11, P < .00001). Due to the small sample size and low quality of the RCTs included, the overall certainty of the evidence is low. Conclusion: Compared with the control intervention measures, acupuncture combined with traditional Chinese medicine therapy may be an effective complementary therapy for treating GU. It has shown good clinical efficacy, significantly improving the eradication rate of Hp, gastrin levels, and having a relatively low recurrence rate. No increase in adverse events has been reported, suggesting a favorable safety profile in clinical practice. However, further high-quality, large-scale studies are needed to confirm these results.
Liang et al. (Fri,) studied this question.