Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Review Article

Astragalus in the Prevention of Upper Respiratory Tract Infection in Children with Nephrotic Syndrome: Evidence-Based Clinical Practice

Table 5

Grade assessment of studies. Question: should Huangqi versus conventional treatment be used for upper respiratory tract infection? Settings: parallel RCT.
Upper respiratory tract infection rate
Quality assessmentNo. of patientsEffect Quality Importance
No. of studiesDesignRisk of biasInconsistencyIndirectnessImprecisionOther considerationsHuangqiConventional treatmentRelative (95% CI)Absolute
       16/67 (23.9%) 27/63
(42.9%)		 19 fewer per 100 (from 3 fewer to 29 fewer)  
2Randomised trialsSerious1No serious inconsistencyNo serious indirectnessSerious2None10%RR 0.56 (0.33 to 0.93)4 fewer per 100 (from 1 fewer to 7 fewer)  
Low		Critical
       40% 18 fewer per 100 (from 3 fewer to 27 fewer)  
Studies were at unclear risk of bias, for the paper did not provide the bias information of the study design. So we determine the potential limitations are likely to lower confidence in the estimate of effect.
2Total number of events is less than 300, and a relative risk reduction (RRR) or relative risk increase (RRI) is greater than 25%.