Ling, Jia-Yan, Shen, Lin, Liu, Qing et al. · Zhongguo zhen jiu = Chinese acupuncture & moxibustion · 2013
This study tested whether acupuncture given at a specific time of day (9-11 AM) could help ME/CFS patients better than acupuncture given at other times. Eighty patients received either timed acupuncture or standard acupuncture over two 10-day treatment sessions. The timed acupuncture group showed greater improvement in fatigue, particularly mental fatigue, and showed better changes in immune cell counts.
Timing-dependent treatment responses could represent an actionable approach to optimizing acupuncture efficacy for ME/CFS patients. Understanding whether circadian variation influences immune regulation through T cell modulation may inform future chronobiological interventions in fatigue disorders.
This study does not establish that acupuncture is more effective than placebo or other standard treatments for ME/CFS, as there was no sham acupuncture control group. The immune cell changes observed are biomarker associations only and do not prove they cause symptom improvement. The results are limited to patients with the traditional Chinese medicine diagnosis of 'qi deficiency syndrome' and may not generalize to all ME/CFS presentations.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Ling, Jia-Yan, Shen, Lin, Liu, Qing, & Wang, Ling-Yun (2013). [Impacts on chronic fatigue syndrome of qi deficiency syndrome and T cell subgroups in patients treated with acupuncture at selective time].. Zhongguo zhen jiu = Chinese acupuncture & moxibustion. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24617226/
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-ling-2013-impacts-chronic,
author = {Ling, Jia-Yan and Shen, Lin and Liu, Qing and Wang, Ling-Yun},
title = {[Impacts on chronic fatigue syndrome of qi deficiency syndrome and T cell subgroups in patients treated with acupuncture at selective time].},
journal = {Zhongguo zhen jiu = Chinese acupuncture & moxibustion},
year = {2013},
note = {PubMed: 24617226},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/ling-2013-impacts-chronic},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-30. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/ling-2013-impacts-chronic
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