Chinese herbal medicine for the treatment of chronic rhinosinusitis: protocol for a systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Background: In east Asian countries, the traditional treatment is to treat chronic rhinosinusitis(CRS) with some herbal formulas. However, there is a lack of clinical evidence to support the effect of the drug. Here, we describe a randomized controlled trial to investigate the efficacy and safety of herbal formulations for the treatment of CRS.Methods: We will search electronic databases including the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM), PubMed, Embase, Chinese Science and Technology Periodical Database (VIP), China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and Wanfang database using keywords related to CRS and Chinese herbal medicine. Extensive database search was carried out for CRS related randomized controlled trials.Two reviewers(SH and LL) will independently filter the search results to determine eligible articles, complete data collection.The quality of individual trials will be assessed by(XZ and YF) using the Cochrane collaborative bias risk assessment tool. We will calculate the relative risk and 95% confidence interval(CI) of the dichotomy results and the weighted average difference, as well as the corresponding 95% confidence interval of the continuous results. Statistical methods such as subgroup analysis and sensitivity analysis will be used to investigate the sources of heterogeneity.Discussion: The systematic review and meta-analysis will provide evidence for the quality of life and the safety of traditional Chinese medicine in CRS patients.This study will provide a high quality research method for the therapeutic effect of Chinese herbal medicine on CRS, and will also help broaden research horizons for the complementary and alternative therapy of CRS.Systematic review registrationPROSPERO registration number: CRD42019123047(https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42019123047).