Honey for acute cough in children — a systematic review

To analyze the efficacy of using honey to treat acute cough in children. Systematic review, synthesis without meta-analysis. We searched PubMed, Scopus, CENTRAL, CINAHL, and Web of Science databases on August 15, 2022, for words honey and cough. Randomized controlled trials conducted in children were included. Risk-of-bias and evidence quality were assessed. Studies were not pooled due to lack of key information. Instead, we provided the range of observed effects for the main outcomes. Three hundred ninety-six papers were screened, and 10 studies were included. Two studies had high risk-of-bias and six had some concerns. Honey seemed to decrease cough frequency more than placebo/no treatment (range of observed effect 0.0–1.1 points) and cough medication (0.2–0.9 points). Sleep improved more often in the honey group (range of effect was 0.0–1.1) compared to placebo/no treatment and (− 0.2–1.1 points) compared to cough medication. Quality of the evidence was low to very low. Conclusion: We found low quality evidence that honey may be more effective than cough medication or placebo/no treatment in relieving symptoms and improving sleep in children with acute cough. Better quality randomized, placebo-controlled blinded trials are needed to confirm the effectiveness of honey in treating acute cough in children. Trial registration: CRD42022369577. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00431-023-05066-1.