Efficacy of traditional chinese medicine in the treatment of rash caused by epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors: A frequency statistics and meta-analysis

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in the treatment of rash caused by epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors (EGFRIs). Materials and Methods: Foreign language database (such as PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, EMBASE) and Chinese language database (such as China National Knowledge Infrastructure, VIP Database for Chinese Technical Periodicals [VIP], Wangfang, CBM disc) were searched for all trials of TCM in the treatment of rash caused by EGFRIs until January of 2019. We also looked through the references of relevant studies to supplement additional trials. The SPSS 25.0 was used for statistics of TCM with high frequency, and Review Manager 5.3 was used for meta-analysis. Results: A total of 22 studies were included in the study. We selected TCM whose frequency were >3.0%. They were Lonicera japonica(金银花), Licorice Roots Northwest Origin(生甘草), Cortex Dictamni(白鲜皮), Radix Sophorae Flavescentis(苦参), Schizonepeta(荆芥), Saposhnikovia Divaricate(防风). The meta-analysis revealed that the efficacy of TCM in treating EGFRIs-related rash was better than that of Western medicine or none. Conclusions: TCM could significantly relieve rash caused by EGFRIs, which is worth popularizing. Moreover, the mechanism deserves to be further explored.

Keywords

• epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors
• meta-analysis
• rash
• traditional chinese medicine