TY  - JOUR
PB  - MDPI AG
ID  - discovery10191615
UR  - https://doi.org/10.3390/antibiotics13040364
N2  - Respiratory tract infections (RTIs) are the leading cause of antibiotic prescriptions, primarily due to the risk for secondary bacterial infections. In this study, we examined whether Echinacea could reduce the need for antibiotics by preventing RTIs and their complications, and subsequently investigated its safety profile. A comprehensive search of EMBASE, PubMed, Google Scholar, Cochrane DARE and clinicaltrials.gov identified 30 clinical trials (39 comparisons) studying Echinacea for the prevention or treatment of RTIs in 5652 subjects. Echinacea significantly reduced the monthly RTI occurrence, risk ratio (RR) 0.68 (95% CI 0.61?0.77) and number of patients with ?1 RTI, RR = 0.75 [95% CI 0.69?0.81] corresponding to an odds ratio 0.53 [95% CI 0.42?0.67]. Echinacea reduced the risk of recurrent infections (RR = 0.60; 95% CI 0.46?0.80), RTI complications (RR = 0.44; 95% CI 0.36?0.54) and the need for antibiotic therapy (RR = 0.60; 95% CI 0.39?0.93), with total antibiotic therapy days reduced by 70% (IRR = 0.29; 95% CI 0.11?0.74). Alcoholic extracts from freshly harvested Echinacea purpurea were the strongest, with an 80% reduction of antibiotic treatment days, IRR 0.21 [95% CI 0.15?0.28]. An equal number of adverse events occurred with Echinacea and control treatment. Echinacea can safely prevent RTIs and associated complications, thereby decreasing the demand for antibiotics. Relevant differences exist between Echinacea preparations.
TI  - Echinacea Reduces Antibiotics by Preventing Respiratory Infections: A Meta-Analysis (ERA-PRIMA)
N1  - Copyright © 2024 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
JF  - Antibiotics
SN  - 2079-6382
KW  - Echinacea; prevention; respiratory tract infections; antibiotics; recurrent RTIs; complications
IS  - 4
A1  - Gancitano, Giuseppe
A1  - Mucci, Nicola
A1  - Stange, Rainer
A1  - Ogal, Mercedes
A1  - Vimalanathan, Selvarani
A1  - Sreya, Mahfuza
A1  - Booker, Anthony
A1  - Hadj-Cherif, Bushra
A1  - Albrich, Werner
A1  - Woelkart-Ardjomand, Karin
A1  - Kreft, Samo
A1  - Berghe, Wim Vanden
A1  - Hoexter, Godehard
A1  - Schapowal, Andreas
A1  - Johnston, Sebastian
AV  - public
VL  - 13
Y1  - 2024/04//
ER  -