Serum exosomal miRNAs as diagnostic and prognostic of migraine patients treated with acupuncture

Migraine is a chronic neurological disorder characterized by attacks of moderate-to-severe headaches and various neurological symptoms. The diagnosis and relief of migraine are solely by self-reported clinical symptoms. We conducted this study to identify diagnostic biomarkers which helped to differentiate migraine without aura (MWoA) patients from healthy controls (HC) and identify prognostic biomarkers which helped to predict the effect of acupuncture. We isolated the exosomes from the serum of 20 MWoA patients and 10 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. The MWoA patients were treated with true acupuncture group (trAMWoA) and sham acupuncture group (shAMWoA). After the exosomes were characterized and total RNA was isolated, small RNA sequencing was performed for the exosomes.