{"doi":"10.1002/onco.13933","title":"<scp>Health-Related</scp> Quality of Life in Cancer Survivors with <scp>Chemotherapy-Induced</scp> Peripheral Neuropathy: A Randomized Clinical Trial","abstract":"BACKGROUND: Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN) is a common, debilitating adverse effect of neurotoxic chemotherapy that significantly worsens the quality of life of cancer survivors. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Survivors of solid tumors with persistent moderate-to-severe CIPN defined as numbness, tingling, or pain rated ≥4 on an 11-point numeric rating scale (NRS) were randomized in a 1:1:1 ratio to 8 weeks of real acupuncture (RA) versus sham acupuncture (SA) versus usual care (UC). We previously reported the primary endpoint (NRS); here we report the following health-related quality of life endpoints: Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy/Gynecologic Oncology Group-Neurotoxicity (FACT/GOG-Ntx), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), Insomnia Severity Index (ISI), and Brief Fatigue Inventory (BFI). For each endpoint, the mean changes from baseline and 95% confidence intervals were estimated within each arm and compared between arms using linear mixed models. RESULTS: We enrolled 75 survivors of solid tumors with moderate-to-severe CIPN into the study. Compared with baseline, at week 8, FACT/GOG-Ntx, HADS anxiety, and ISI scores significantly improved in RA and SA, but not in UC. Compared with UC, at week 8, FACT/GOG-Ntx scores significantly increased in RA and SA arms indicating improved CIPN-related symptoms and quality of life (p = .001 and p = .01). There was no statistically significant difference between RA and SA. There was no difference in HADS depression or BFI among RA, SA, and UC at weeks 8 and 12. CONCLUSION: Acupuncture may improve CIPN-related symptoms and quality of life in cancer survivors with persistent CIPN. Further large sample size studies are needed to delineate placebo effects. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: The authors conducted a randomized sham acupuncture- and usual care-controlled clinical trial to evaluate the impact of acupuncture on health-related quality of life outcomes in patients with solid tumors with chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN). Statistically significant improvements in quality of life, anxiety, insomnia, and fatigue were achieved with 8 weeks of real acupuncture when compared with baseline, without statistically significant differences between real and sham acupuncture. These findings suggest that acupuncture may be effective for improving CIPN-related symptoms and quality of life and reducing anxiety and insomnia in cancer survivors with persistent CIPN, with further study needed to delineate placebo effects.","journal":"The Oncologist","year":2021,"id":156310,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":55,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9248,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":316495,"name":"Raymond E. Baser","orcid":"0000-0002-1644-4090","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":265792,"name":"Connie Chen","orcid":"0000-0001-5384-4707","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":660538,"name":"Matthew Weitzman","orcid":"0000-0003-3439-0353","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":661198,"name":"Yi Lily Zhang","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":309035,"name":"Christina Seluzicki","orcid":"0000-0002-8553-6810","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":570625,"name":"Qing Susan Li","orcid":null,"position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":281221,"name":"Lauren Piulson","orcid":"0000-0001-7034-3445","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":281219,"name":"Wanqing Iris Zhi","orcid":"0000-0003-4263-7272","position":8,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":281217,"name":"Ting Bao","orcid":"0000-0003-4437-2597","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":35,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:44:08.368845Z","pmid":"34390283","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}