AI Article Synopsis

  • Chronic fatigue is a key symptom of long COVID, and this study investigates how Traditional, Complementary, and Integrative Medicine (TCIM) can help alleviate this fatigue.* -
  • Thirteen randomized controlled trials (RCTs) with a total of 1,632 participants were analyzed, revealing that some herbal treatments, like Bufei Huoxue capsules and Ludangshen liquid, showed potential in reducing fatigue levels.* -
  • However, the overall evidence is considered low to very low in quality due to bias concerns, indicating a need for more extensive and higher-quality studies to validate these findings.*

Article Abstract

Background: Chronic fatigue is a predominant symptom of post COVID-19 condition, or long COVID. We aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Traditional, Complementary and Integrative Medicine (TCIM) for fatigue post COVID-19 infection.

Methods: Ten English and Chinese language databases and grey literature were searched up to 12 April 2023 for randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Cochrane "Risk of bias" (RoB) tool was applied. Evidence certainty was assessed using Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE). Effect estimates were presented as risk ratio (RR) or mean difference (MD) with 95% confidence interval (CI).

Results: Thirteen RCTs with 1632 participants were included. One RCT showed that Bufei Huoxue herbal capsules reduced fatigue (n=129, MD -14.90, 95%CI -24.53 to -5.27), one RCT reported that Ludangshen herbal liquid lowered fatigue (n=184, MD -1.90, 95%CI -2.38 to -1.42), and the other one RCT shown that fatigue disappearance rate was higher with Ludangshen herbal liquid (n=184, RR 4.19, 95%CI 2.06 to 8.53). Compared to traditional Chinese medicine rehabilitation (TCM-rahab) alone, one RCT showed that fatigue symptoms were lower following Qingjin Yiqi granules plus TCM-rehab (n=388, MD -0.48, 95%CI -0.50 to -0.46). Due to concerns with RoB and/or imprecision, the certainty in this evidence was low to very low. No serious adverse events was reported.

Conclusions: Limited evidence suggests that various TCIM interventions might reduce post COVID-19 fatigue. Larger, high quality RCTs of longer duration are required to confirm these preliminary findings.

Study Registration: The protocol of this review has been registered at PROSPERO: CRD42022384136.

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Source
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11090862PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.imr.2024.101039DOI Listing

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