Acupuncture in the Emergency Department for Pain Management
Public ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT04880733. Field values are reproduced from the official study page; the official ClinicalTrials.gov record remains the source of truth for eligibility, enrollment, and contact information.
Data is sourced from official ClinicalTrials.gov public API records. Always review the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for the latest information.
Official title
Acupuncture in the Emergency Department for Pain Management: A BraveNet Multi-Center Feasibility Study
Brief summary
Reproduced verbatim from the official ClinicalTrials.gov record. Not medical advice.
Our goal is to use the R01 mechanism to conduct a two-arm multisite, feasibility RCT (Acupuncture vs Usual Care) to refine procedures for conducting a future fully powered multi-site RCT. The effort will be led by the BraveNet Coordinating Center at Einstein and include 3 BraveNet PBRN sites University Hospitals/ Case Western Reserve University (UH/Case), Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC), and University of California-San Diego (UCSD). During Year 1 (Aim 1), we will develop the manualized acupuncture intervention with consensus from experts in the delivery of acupuncture for acute pain. At the end of Year 1 (prior to the start of the RCT), a study investigator meeting will be held to ensure consistent training of all study coordinators and acupuncturists to the study data collection, human subjects, intervention delivery, and reporting requirements. In Year 2-3 (Aim 2), we will enroll 165 participants (55 per site) into the randomized trial (1:1 assignment to Acupuncture or Usual Care) over a \~9-month enrollment period for each site. Sites will participate in the study sequentially, thus general findings from the implementation evaluation may be used to improve implementation at subsequent sites. Treatment outcomes include pain intensity, state anxiety and pain medication utilization within the ED (via EHR data extraction). In Aim 2a, 75 structured qualitative interviews of ED providers, staff, study acupuncturists (\~10 per site) and acupuncture patients (\~15 per site) and direct observation at each site will be used to identify barriers and facilitators of successful implementation. The Implementation Evaluation includes two broad categories of data: implementation outcomes (collected in Aim 2 as the feasibility study is conducted at each site) and explanatory factors (Aim 2a).
Study identification
- NCT ID
- NCT04880733
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Not applicable
- Enrollment
- 290 participants
Conditions and interventions
Conditions
Interventions
- Acupuncture for pain management Procedure
- Usual care for pain management Other
Procedure · Other
Eligibility (public fields only)
- Age range
- 18 Years and older
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Healthy volunteers not accepted
This page does not interpret eligibility. Detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria are on the official ClinicalTrials.gov record.
Study timeline
- Start date
- May 2, 2021
- Primary completion
- Sep 23, 2022
- Completion
- Aug 30, 2025
- Last update posted
- Jan 4, 2026
2021 – 2025
United States locations
- U.S. sites
- 4
- U.S. states
- 4
- U.S. cities
- 4
| Facility | City | State | ZIP | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of California San Diego | La Jolla | California | 92093 | — |
| Einstein School of Medicine | The Bronx | New York | 10461 | — |
| University Hospitals/Case Western Reserve University- Cleveland Medical Center | Cleveland | Ohio | 44106 | — |
| Vandebilt University Medical Center | Nashville | Tennessee | 37232 | — |
Site contact phone numbers, emails, and investigator names are intentionally not displayed here. Open the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for site contact information.
About this trial record page
- What this page shows
- Public field values for ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT04880733, including study identification, conditions, interventions, eligibility (age, sex, healthy volunteer), timeline, and U.S. site list.
- What this page does not do
- No medical advice, eligibility judgments, treatment recommendations, study quality scoring, or AI-generated medical summaries. No site contact phone numbers, emails, or investigator names.
- Where the data comes from
- Sourced from the official ClinicalTrials.gov public API. The official record is the source of truth.
- Last refresh
- Last update posted Jan 4, 2026 · Synced Sep 6, 2026
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Open the official record
The complete protocol, eligibility criteria, and contact information for NCT04880733 live on ClinicalTrials.gov.