A total of 80 volunteers of patients with rheumatoid arthritis will be recruited from the Chinese medicine or Western medicine clinics in China Medical University Hospital and Dalin Tzu-Chi Hospital. These patients will be randomized to receive electroacupuncture (40 participants) or transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (40 participants) treatment two sessions per week and for 10 treatments in total.~The investigators expect that electroacupuncture or transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation can reduce the severity of pain in the patients with rheumatoid arthritis. The effectiveness of electroacupuncture or transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation can be detected by visual analogue scale, simplified disease activity index, and disease activity score and be used to improve the clinical symptoms and quality of life.
The aim of this pilot study is to compare the effectiveness of electroacupuncture or transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation in reducing the tenderness in the patients with rheumatoid arthritis. The study adopted a pragmatic, randomized, patient-centered approach to investigate the effectiveness of clinical symptoms and quality of life.