SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Pharmacol.
Sec. Ethnopharmacology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fphar.2025.1588586
This article is part of the Research TopicPrevention and Treatment of Infectious Diseases by Herbal MedicineView all 14 articles
Oral commercial Chinese polyherbal preparation com bined with conventional biomedicine treatment for th e treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis: Network Meta -analysis
Provisionally accepted
- 1Anhui University of Chinese Medicine, Hefei, China
- 2Anhui Xinhua University, Hefei, Anhui, China
- 3Anhui Provincial Key Laboratory of Applied Transformation for Prevention and Treatment of Major Pulmonary Diseases with Traditional Chinese Medicine, HeiFei, China
- 4First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Hefei, Anhui Province, China
- 5Institute of Prevention and Treatment of Respiratory Diseases, Anhui Provincial Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, HeFei, China
- 6Institute of Prevention and Treatment of Respiratory Diseases, Anhui Provincial Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, HeiFei, China
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Background: Despite therapeutic interventions, tuberculosis (TB) remains a persistent challenge. Combination therapy integrating Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) with conventional anti-TB medications demonstrates therapeutic benefits, necessitating a meta-analysis evaluating the adjunctive use of oral commercial Chinese polyherbal preparation (CCPP). Objective: This study aims to evaluate the efficacy and safety of different oral TCMs combined with biomedicine for tuberculosis treatment, utilizing network meta-analysis techniques. Methods: A computer-based search was conducted across various databases including the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Wanfang Database, VIP Database, SinoMed, PubMed, EMbase, Web of Science, and the Cochrane Library, covering records from database inception to January 22, 2025. Data analysis utilized Stata 18.0, R software (version 4.4.1), and Review Manager 5.4. Results: A total of 100 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were included, with a total sample size of 12,747 participants (6,639 in the experimental group and 6,108 in the control group), evaluating 12 distinct interventions. Network meta-analysis revealed the following optimal combinations: FeiJieHe Pill combined with standard biomedicine demonstrated superior efficacy for clinical response rate improvement (OR = 8.43, 95% CI [1.79, 39.69]). KangLao Pill combined with standard biomedicine was the most effective for negative conversion rate (OR = 11.55, 95% CI [3.04, 43.93]). Bu Jin Tablet combined with standard biomedicine demonstrated superior efficacy for lesion absorption rate (OR = 7.46, 95% CI [3.32, 16.75]). FeiJieHe Pill combined with standard biomedicine was the most effective for cavity absorption (OR = 5.11, 95% CI [2.04, 12.85]). JieHe Pill combined with conventional biomedicine yielded the greatest improvement in both CD3+ T lymphocyte response (OR = 5.6, 95% CI [3.4, 7.8]) and CD4+ T lymphocyte response (OR = 5.1, 95% CI [2.9, 7.3]). Conclusion: Combination therapy utilizing oral CCPP alongside conventional biomedicine has a significant enhanced efficacy relative to conventional biomedicine monotherapy across multiple tuberculosis treatment metrics, including clinical efficacy rate, negative conversion rate, lesion absorption rate, cavity absorption rate, and improvement rates of CD3+ and CD4+ T lymphocyte levels.
Keywords: Tuberculosis, Integrated Traditional Chinese and biomedicine, Oral traditional Chinese medicine, Network meta-analysis, randomized controlled trials
Received: 06 Mar 2025; Accepted: 24 Sep 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Jiang, Zhang, Wang, Zhang, Li, Tong and Wu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Fan Wu, wufan200610@126.com
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