To determine the efficacy of acupuncture for hypertension, a review studied 23 clinic trials involved 1788 patients with hypertension. Two trials of those revealed that acupuncture as an adjunct to medication was more effective on reducing systolic and diastolic blood pressure, compared with sham acupuncture plus medication. Four trials of those also showed acupuncture combined with medication was superior to medication on efficacy. 17 clinic trials involved in 1473 patients with hypertension showed that acupuncture alone did not have significant effect on reducing systolic and diastolic blood pressure compared with medication alone. No adverse events were reported in those clinic trails.

Other  review studied 8 databases involved 15 systematic reviews. They found that acupuncture combined with medication was better in reducing both systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure, compared with medication alone. Acupuncture was more effective in reducing systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure, compared with sham acupuncture plus medications. No serious adverse effects were reported.

To further evaluate the efficacy and safety of acupuncture therapy for patients with hypertension, a review analyzed 30 clinic trials involved in 21007 patients with hypertension. The pooled results demonstrate that acupuncture plus anti-hypertensive drugs are better than anti-hypertensive drugs alone at reducing systolic and diastolic blood pressure. The same result was observed for pooled data from experiments that compared acupuncture plus medication to sham acupuncture plus medication at reducing blood pressure. However, there is no difference between acupuncture alone and antihypertensive drugs alone in the effect on lowering blood pressure.

 In conclusion, most clinic trials provided evidence that acupuncture is an adjunctive therapy to medication for treating hypertension. However, the evidence for acupuncture alone to lower blood pressure is still insufficient.