Over the counter cough medicines for acute cough

doi:10.1136/bmj.324.7346.1158

BMJ 2002;324:1158 ( 11 May )

Letters

Over the counter cough medicines for acute cough

The fact that people keep buying the medicines is itself evidence

Good quality research is needed

Gap exists between practice and research

The fact that people keep buying the medicines is itself evidence

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR $---$ Schroeder and Fahey are right to urge caution in interpreting the results of their systematic review on cough medicines,and their recommendation to change existing guidance on coughmedicines in the United Kingdom is not justified.¹

Their review considered a heterogeneous group of products that included many different active ingredients from several differentdrug classes. It is surely impossible to draw from this any meaningfulconclusions about over the counter cough medicines as a whole.Many of the products and active ingredients in the reviewed trialsare either not available at all in the United Kingdom (moguisteine,bromhexine), are only available on prescription (salbutamol, terfenadine),or are not indicated for the relief of cough (loratidine,terfenadine).

Only 15 trials were included in the review, and only one reported a power calculation. As the authors concede, it seems highlylikely that many of the remainder did not include sufficient patients. . . [Full text of this article]

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Relevant Article

Systematic review of randomised controlled trials of over the counter cough medicines for acute cough in adults: Knut Schroeder and Tom Fahey
BMJ 2002 324: 329. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]