Over the last years, basic research on acupuncture has been gradually revealing its underlying mechanisms which explain how acupuncture acts and produces its biological effects. The clinical results that acupuncturists have been experiencing for many years, are now being translated into biomedical terms.

Anyhow, the greatest contribution given to healthcare policymakers comes from clinical trials, above all when they are conducted following the widely accepted scientific rules. Both clinicians and policymakers are mainly interested in the most common diseases and in those conditions for which modern biomedicine provides few treatment options.

Nowadays, medical doctors more often search recent literature for treatment options to face the challenges represented by the diseases they encounter every day in their clinical practice and for which the western therapies are either scarce or associated with severe side effects.

At the same time, chronicity appears to be our century challenge for healthcare policymakers; that’s why WHO – soon followed by national governments including the Italian one - has created a special task force for its prevention and control. Among the main problems associated with chronic diseases – often coexisting within the same patient – the risk for drug-drug interactions should be mentioned, for it depends on the simultaneous administration of multiple different molecules and requires proper and effective management of drug-related adverse events.

The aim of this panel is to review the recent clinical trials suggesting that acupuncture can be bothan effective therapy to treat common diseases, such as headache or low back pain, and an adjunct to improve quality of life in patients with severe conditions. The purpose is to draw policymakers’ attention and offer clinicians another treatment option.