Clinical efficacy of Lianhua Qingwen integrated with Western medicine on COVID-19 by Meta-analysis

ABSTRACT

Objective: To systematically evaluate the efficacy of Lianhua Qingwen (LQC) on COVID-19, and provide evidence for the formulation and optimization of clinical therapy on COVID-19. Methods: Six databases (PubMed, Cochrane Library, Wanfang, Weipu, CBM and CNKI) were searched up to May 27, 2020. The Cochrane collaborative bias risk tool was used for risk evaluation and quality assessment;Meta-analysis was carried out by Stata 15 software. Begg's test was used for publication bias. Results: Seven clinical trials were included with 665 COVID-19 patients. Compared with Western medicine alone, integrated Lianhua Qingwen significantly improved the effective rate of clinical symptoms [RR = 1.24, 95% CI (1.12, 1.38), P < 0.05] of COVID-19, increased CT improvement [RR = 1.14, 95% CI (1.02, 1.28), P < 0.05] and reduced the proportion of progressing into sever clinical level [RR = 0.48, 95% CI (0.31, 0.72), P < 0.05];In addition, integrated Lianhua Qingwen could effectively shorten the duration of fever [SMD = -0.87, 95% CI (-1.22,-0.52), P < 0.05], time of clinical symptoms disappearance [SMD = -1.19, 95% CI (-1.56, -0.82), P < 0.05] and hospital stay [SMD = -0.61, 95% CI (-0.91, -0.30), P < 0.05]. Conclusion: Lianhua Qingwen could be used as adaptive and complementary medicine to improve clinical symptoms and CT for COVID-19.