Acupuncture enhances the efficacy of antibiotics treatment for canine otitis crises.

External bacterial otitis is a very frequent dog's recurrent complaint and should be useful for studying acupuncture effects in infectious disease. Conventional treatment based on antibiotics, washes and bactericidal ointments, solves most cases within 1 to 6 weeks. To establish if the well known effect of this conventional treatment could be modified by acupuncture as additional treatment, a comparative randomized placebo controlled study was performed. From a sample of 25 dogs, two groups were selected at random. In addition to a conventional treatment, each group also received real acupuncture or placebo acupuncture. A veterinarian M.D. and the animal's owner evaluated at blind, through a Visual Analogous Scale, (VAS) the clinical signs and symptoms of otitis. The results show a significant difference in the complete recovery time (p < 0.01); in the disappearance period of the pain (p < 0.01) in the disappearance period of the secretion (p < 0.001) and in the animal's owner evaluation of symptoms (p < 0.001) by 6th. day of treatment. These results suggest that acupuncture stimulates animal defensive systems increasing the conventional treatment effect, which seems to work mainly against the invading agent while acupuncture seems to act by reinforcing the host's defensive barriers. Combination of both shows a synergistic effect capable of empowering the anti-infectious therapy. A three months follow-up revealed all animals were without symptoms. Further evaluation of both groups after a one year follow up will allow us to establish if relapse incidence is also modified by acupuncture, and the potential usefulness of this complementary treatment on recurrent infectious pathology.