title: Compound Danshen (Salvia miltiorrhiza) dripping pill for coronary heart disease: an overview of systematic reviews.
abstract: Compound Danshen dripping pill (CDDP) is commonly used to treat coronary heart disease (CHD) in China. However, clinical practice has not been informed by evidence from relevant systematic reviews (SRs). This overview aims at summarizing evidence from SRs on CDDP for the treatment of CHD. We included SRs of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on CDDP in treating CHD until March 2014 by searching the Cochrane Library, PubMed, EMBASE and four Chinese databases. Data were extracted according to a pre-designed form. We assessed the quality of SRs according to AMSTAR and graded the quality of evidence in the included SRs using the GRADE approach. All data analyses were descriptive. About 13 SRs involving a total of 34,071 participants with angina or acute myocardial infarction (AMI) were included. Few SRs assessed endpoints (5/13, 38.5%) and quality of life (QOL) (4/13, 30.8%). Most of the SRs suggested that CDDP had potential benefits for patients with CHD, such as improving symptoms and electrocardiogram (ECG) results, with few adverse reactions, while benefits in endpoints were unproved. Moreover, the overall quality of evidence in the SRs was poor, ranging from "very low" to "moderate", and most of the included SRs were of "low" (3/13, 23.1%) or "moderate" (9/13, 69.2%) quality with many serious flaws. Current SRs suggested potential benefits of CDDP for the treatment of CHD. However, high-quality evidence is warranted to support the application of CDDP in treating CHD.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Medical College, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing 100029, China.
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Luo
authors.forename: Weijiang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Song
authors.forename: Guoyan
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Hao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Keji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Chen
mesh_terms: D000284:Administration, Oral; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000188:drug therapy*; D016206:Databases, Bibliographic; D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal / Q000008:administration & dosage / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D004562:Electrocardiography; D023381:Endpoint Determination; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006801:Humans; D011788:Quality of Life; D016032:Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic; D027561:Salvia miltiorrhiza; D013607:Tablets
chemical_list: D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal; D013607:Tablets; C028972:dan-shen root extract
keywords: Chinese Medicine; Coronary Heart Disease; Overview; Salvia miltiorrhiza; Systematic Review