Non-pharmacological treatments for adult patients with functional constipation: a systematic review protocol

INTRODUCTION: The aim of this review is to assess the effectiveness, efficacy and safety of non-pharmacological therapies for patients with functional constipation. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: We will electronically search OVID MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane library, CINAHL, AMED and ISI web of knowledge without any language restrictions. We will also try to obtain literatures from other sources, such as a hand search of library journals or conference abstracts. After searching and screening of the studies, we will run a meta-analysis of the included randomised-controlled trials. We will summarise the results as risk ratio for dichotomous data and standardised or weighted mean difference for continuous data. DISSEMINATION: This systematic review will summarise current evidence for using non-pharmacological therapies to treat functional constipation, and will be disseminated through peer-review publications or conference presentations. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: PROSPERO 2014: CRD42014006686.