We thank Hinman and her colleagues for their considered reply to our letter. We accept that our approach was more informal than their response, but in our defence, we were writing originally for the audience of a general journal, rather than for methodologist and statisticians.
The main point we wished to make concerns the decision to power a study without any reference to previous literature or pilot data within the setting adopted. Of course it seems superficially justified to adopt a minimum change that you wish to measure (in this case a difference over sham of 1.8 on a 10 point scale), but if this difference has never been achieved in previous research it seems odd to invest so much unless the intention was to provide evidence of a lack of effect for acupuncture and laser acupuncture. More….http://acupmed.bmjjournals.com/content/33/1/86/reply
Virginia Institute of Traditional Chinese Medicine 
Acupuncture treatment for chronic knee pain: study by Hinman et al underestimates acupuncture efficacy
Posted in Articles from online, commentary, tagged Acupuncture, Acupuncture in Medicine, acupuncture trial, chronic knee pain, dosage, methodology flaws, Rana Hinman on April 14, 2015| Leave a Comment »
Acupuncture treatment for chronic knee pain: study by Hinman et al underestimates acupuncture efficacy.
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