[Development of studies on the underlying mechanism of acupuncture intervention in reducing post-ischemic inflammatory reaction and the related new research thought].

Studies show that the inflammatory reaction plays an important role in cerebral ischemia/reperfusion injury. Post-ischemic inflammation is a dynamic process involving a series of complicated interactions among various inflammatory cells and molecules. Recently, researches on the effect of acupuncture in inhibiting post-ischemic inflammation had been conducted and achieved favorable results. Authors of the present paper review the recent development of studies on the underlying neuroprotective mechanism of acupuncture in inhibiting post-ischemic inflammation in the brain tissue from 1) regulation of inflammatory cytokines and mediators, 2) inhibition of leucocytic infiltration, 3) modulation of the activated state of glial cells, and 4) suppression of the expression of the related transcription factors. Moreover, combining the key target point, peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma (PPAR-gamma) mediating the process of post-ischemic inflammatory cascade response, this paper discusses the future research trend. Joint application of acupuncture and medication (including Chinese herbal medicines) for mediating the key target of post-ischemic inflammation cascade should be studied in both clinical practice and basic experiments.