Plos One
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Meta Analysis
Efficacy of Tai Chi on pain, stiffness and function in patients with osteoarthritis: a meta-analysis.
Whether Tai Chi benefits patients with osteoarthritis remains controversial. We performed a meta-analysis to assess the effectiveness of Tai Chi exercise for pain, stiffness, and physical function in patients with osteoarthritis. ⋯ Twelve-week Tai Chi is beneficial for improving arthritic symptoms and physical function in patients with osteoarthritis and should be included in rehabilitation programs. However, the evidence may be limited by potential biases; thus, larger scale randomized controlled trials are needed to confirm the current findings and investigate the long-term effects of Tai Chi.
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Meta Analysis Comparative Study
Comparative efficacy and safety of deferoxamine, deferiprone and deferasirox on severe thalassemia: a meta-analysis of 16 randomized controlled trials.
A meta-analysis was conducted to investigate the efficacy and safety of three main iron chelators, namely, deferoxamine (DFO), deferiprone (DFP) and deferasirox (DFX) for thalassemia major (TM) patients. ⋯ Findings indicated that the most effective and safe iron chelators remains to be proven, and further large-scale, long-term studies are needed.
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Meta Analysis
The effect of anesthetic technique on survival in human cancers: a meta-analysis of retrospective and prospective studies.
Animal models have shown that regional anesthesia (combined with or without general anesthesia) would attenuate the surgical stress response by preserving immune function and result in better long-term outcome. In order to test the hypothesis that cancer patients who had surgery with epidural anesthesia (EA) would have better outcome (either overall survival [OS] or recurrence-free survival [RFS]) than those who were general anesthesia (GA), we performed this meta-analysis. By searching relevant literature, a total of 14 studies containing 18 sub-studies (seven in OS analysis and eleven in RFS analysis) were identified and meta-analyzed. ⋯ For RFS, the random-effects model was used to analyze the data and no significant relationship between RFS benefit and EA (HR = 0.88, 95% CI 0.64-1.22, P = 0.457) was detected. In conclusion, our meta-analysis suggests that epidural anesthesia and/or analgesia might be associated with improved overall survival in patients with operable cancer undergoing surgery (especially in colorectal cancer), but it does not support an association between epidural anesthesia and cancer control. Prospective studies are needed to determine whether the association between epidural use and survival is causative.
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Meta Analysis
Effects of Tai Chi in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: preliminary evidence.
Currently, several studies assessed the role of Tai Chi (TC) in management of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, but these studies have wide variation of sample and convey inconclusive results. We therefore undertook a meta-analysis to assess the effects of TC. ⋯ Findings suggest that TC may provide an effective alternative means to achieve results similar to those reported following participation in pulmonary rehabilitation programs. Further studies are needed to substantiate the preliminary findings and investigate the long-term effects of TC.
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Patients with Atrial Fibrillation (AF) and prior stroke are classified as high risk in all risk stratification schemes. A systematic review and meta-analysis was performed to compare the efficacy and safety of New Oral Anticoagulants (NOACs) to warfarin in patients with AF and previous stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA). ⋯ NOACs may not be more effective than warfarin in the secondary prevention of ischemic stroke in patients with a prior history of cerebrovascular ischemia, but have a lower risk of intracranial bleeding.