Sore throat in primary care

doi:10.1136/bmj.b2476

Published 6 August 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b2476
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b2476

Editorials

Sore throat in primary care

Steroids reduce pain in the first day, but data on harms arelacking

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

In the linked study (doi:10.1136/bmj.b2976), Hayward and colleaguesreport a useful and well performed systematic review in a highlytopical area.¹ Clinicians and patients need information aboutinterventions other than antibiotics for sore throat for severalreasons—the benefit of antibiotics for most patients ismodest² ³; the use of antibiotics should be minimised becauseof the danger of resistance³ ⁴; and other effective treatments,apart from the use of analgesics, anti-inflammatory drugs,⁵and possibly Echinacea, are lacking.⁶ This systematic reviewprovides evidence that in the first 24 hours steroids may helpresolve pain (the likelihood of resolution was increased threefold,number needed to treat (NNT) 3.7) and reduce the mean time toonset of pain relief by six hours. Furthermore, given that mostpatients in the included studies had antibiotics, although theeffect of antibiotics is modest, the effect of steroids in thosenot receiving antibiotics may . . . [Full text of this article]

Paul Little, professor of primary care research

¹ University of Southampton, Southampton SO16 5ST

P.Little@soton.ac.uk

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BMJ 2009 339: b2976. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]