Dangguijagyag-san for primary dysmenorrhea: A protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials

BACKGROUND: Primary dysmenorrhea is the most common gynecological disorder in women of reproductive age. In East Asia, traditional herbal medicines have been used for a long time to treat symptoms of primary dysmenorrhea. Dangguijagyag-san (DJS) is one of the most widely known traditional herbal medicine for primary dysmenorrhea. Although there was the previous systematic review of DJS, it had some limitations. To assess the effectiveness of DJS for primary dysmenorrhea and to update the previous review, this protocol was developed to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis. METHODS: We will search the randomized controlled clinical trials of DJS for primary dysmenorrhea from inception to April 2019. The search database will be PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Oriental Medicine Advanced Searching Integrated System, Korean Traditional Knowledge Portal, Korean Medical Database, National Digital Science Library, and the China National Knowledge Infrastructure. Our 2 authors will perform the selection of studies, the extraction of data, and the quality assessment with risk of bias tool independently. To analyze the data, we will conduct the quantitative synthesis. RESULTS: We will synthesize the data from selected studies and estimate the strength of the evidence DJS for the treatment of primary dysmenorrhea. CONCLUSION: This study will provide the scientific evidence of DJS. SYSTEMATIC REVIEW REGISTRATION: PROSPERO registration number is CRD42019130768.