• 1. Department of Urology, Sichuan Academy of Medical Sciences & Sichuan Provincial People’s Hospital, Chengdu 610073, China;2. Department of Andrology, Sichuan Provincial Hospital of TCM & The Teaching Hospital of Chengdu University of TCM, Chengdu 610072, China;
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Objective  To evaluate the effectiveness and safety of traditional Chinese medicine therapies (TCMT) for prostatitis.
Methods  We searched Cochrane Controlled Trials Register (CCTR), China EBM/Cochrane center database (CEBM/CCD), PubMed, Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM), Papers on Academic Conference of China (PACC), Chinese Dissertation Database Full-Text (CDDBFT), and Evidence-based Traditional Chinese Medicine Database (EBTCMD). All searches were updated on January 15, 2007. We also performed a manual search of the RCTs of TCMT for prostatitis among periodicals related to TCM, researched the related studies by correlative websites, such as “Baidu” and “Google”, gray literatures, and studies included in the references of eligible studies. At least two reviewers independently screened the studies for eligibility, evaluated the quality, and extracted the data from the eligible literatures, with a cross-check to confirm accuracy. Different views were settled by a third party. We evaluated the quality of eligible studies with the revised Jadad’s scale, and extracted valid data using data tables. Meta-analyses were performed for homogeneous studies using RevMan 4.3 software. If heterogeneity existed among the studies, descriptive analysis was conducted. The potential publication-bias was analyzed by funnel plot analysis.
Results  A total of 52 randomized clinical trials of TCMT for prostatitis (n=5 209) among 1 282 original studies were identified. The methodological quality ranked high in 9 RCTs (the revised scale were ≥ 4 scores), and 22 RCTS reported the methods of random sequence production. The analysis indicated some TCMT were more effective than the treatments in the controls in relieving the proatatitis patients’ pain or discomfort, paruria, impact of symptoms and NIH-chronic prostatitis symptom index (NIH-CPSI), improving the EPS-WBC and urine flow rate etc. Of the trials, 29 randomized clinical trials of TCMT for prostatitis that studied safety (n=2 502) were identified. The methodological quality ranked high in 8 RCTs (the revised scale were ≥ 4 scores), and 18 RCTs reported the method of random sequence production. Analysis indicated some TCMT may cause lower digestive tract symptoms when compared to the control therapies and some Chinese herbs formulas- may cause sexual disfunction.
Conclusion  Some TCMT may be more effective than the controls in relieving the patients’ pain or discomfort, paruria, impact of symptoms and NIH-CPSI, improving the prostatic tenderness with DRE, improving the EPS-WBC, lecithin lipophore, and urine flow rate etc. However, some TCMT of the trials included may cause lower digestive tract symptoms when compared to the controls, and some Chinese herbs formulas cause sexual disfunction. Because of the generally low methodological quality and the variations of the herbs used, the overall effects cannot be pooled for analysis. More evidence is needed to support this finding.

Citation: QIU Mingxing,XIONG Guobing,GONG Baisheng,WANG Dong,WANG Jiuyuan,ZHANG Shuwu. Traditional Chinese Medicine for Prostatitis: A Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials. Chinese Journal of Evidence-Based Medicine, 2010, 10(1): 56-72. doi: 10.7507/1672-2531.20100143 Copy

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