ArticleEvidence-based complementary and alternative medicine : eCAM2021
Moxibustion Improves Chronic Heart Failure by Inhibiting Autophagy and Inflammation via Upregulation of mTOR Expression.
Article in Evidence-based complementary and alternative medicine : eCAM, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 13 citations in OpenAlex.
- Comparative efficacy of traditional non-pharmacological add-on treatments in patients with stable chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: a systematic review and network meta-analysis.Frontiers in public health · 2025Pooled it
- Moxibustion alleviates autophagy and inhibits ferroptosis to improve cardiac function in rats with post-myocardial infarction heart failure.Journal of traditional Chinese medicine = Chung i tsa chih ying wen pan · 2026Article
- The mTOR Signaling Pathway: Key Regulator and Therapeutic Target for Heart Disease.Biomedicines · 2025Review
- Excessive autophagy of myocardial cells promotes ferroptosis and exacerbates heart failure in the state of myocardial infarction.Archives of medical science : AMS · 2025Article
- Regulation of autonomic nervous system by acupuncture: a heart rate variability study on physical stress.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2025Article
- Dioscin ameliorates doxorubicin-induced heart failure via inhibiting autophagy and apoptosis by controlling the PDK1-mediated Akt/mTOR signaling pathway.The Kaohsiung journal of medical sciences · 2023Article
- Article
- Article
- Moxibustion alleviates chronic heart failure by regulating mitochondrial dynamics and inhibiting autophagy.Experimental and therapeutic medicine · 2022Article
- Direct moxibustion exerts an analgesic effect on cervical spondylotic radiculopathy by increasing autophagy via the Act A/Smads signaling pathway.Brain and behavior · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
How moxibustion improves chronic heart failure is extremely complex and still unclear. This study aimed to explore whether moxibustion inhibits autophagy and reduces inflammation by regulating mTOR expression to induce myocardial protective effects and alleviate symptoms associated with chronic heart failure. Echocardiography was used to detect cardiac function and cardiac structure of rats, including heart rate (HR), left atrium diameter (LA), left ventricular diameter (LV), left ventricular posterior wall (LVPW), interventricular septum (IVS), ejection fraction (EF), and fractional shortening (FS). BNP and NT-pro BNP levels were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Autophagy-associated protein (ATG) genes and mTOR were detected by PCR. The expression of mTOR and phosphorylated-mTOR was detected through western blotting of proteins from myocardial tissue samples. The left ventricular inflammatory response was detected by immunohistochemistry and included ICAM-1, VCAM-1, MMP-2, and MMP-9 expression. The relationship between autophagy and inflammation was analyzed by correlation analysis. The results from echocardiography and ELISA showed that moxibustion could significantly improve heart function and structure. Western blot and PCR results showed that moxibustion treatment elevated mTOR expression. Further, moxibustion could inhibit autophagy and regulate the expression of key autophagy-related genes, including Vps34, ATG3, ATG5, ATG7, ATG12, and ATG13. By contrast, rapamycin could partially reduce the effects of moxibustion. Immunohistochemistry results indicated that moxibustion could reduce myocardial inflammation. Moreover, there was a positive correlation between autophagy and inflammation. Moxibustion can protect cardiac function in rats with heart failure, possibly inhibiting excessive autophagy of cardiomyocytes and reducing inflammatory reactions through the elevation of mTOR expression.
Identifiers
What Socratic holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the Socratic graph.