Acupuncture delivered by a GP may offer relief from menopause symptoms, including hot flushes, sleep disturbances and skin and hair problems, a small study suggests.

The findings show that acupuncture is a potential treatment for women suffering moderate-to-severe symptoms but who would rather avoid hormone therapy, the researchers say.

“The standardised and brief acupuncture treatment produced a fast and clinically relevant reduction in moderate-to-severe menopausal symptoms during the six-week intervention,” write the authors, from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, in BMJ Open.

In their study, 70 women were randomised into two groups to either receive five weeks of acupuncture or no treatment until after six weeks.