Effectiveness and safety of indirect moxibustion for the treatment of allergic rhinitis: A protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis of RCTs

BACKGROUND: Allergic rhinitis (AR) is a common allergic disorder worldwide. Western medicine is not optimistic about the therapeutic effect of this disease. However, moxibustion can enhance vital energy or immunity through a great number of clinical trials. Thus, the aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis is to systematically evaluate the effectiveness and safety of indirect moxibustion for treating AR. METHODS: We will conduct a comprehensive literature search in Medline, PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, the Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure Database, WanFang Database, Chinese Scientific Journal Database, and Chinese Biomedical Literature Database from inception to August 2020 without any language restriction. In addition, we will retrieve the unpublished studies and the references of initially included literature manually. Reviewers will identify studies, extract data, and assess the quality independently. The outcomes of interest include: total effective rate, total nasal symptom score, total non-nasal symptom score, rhinitis quality of life questionnaire, visual analog scale, laboratory indicators (i.e., serum levels of IgE, IgA, or IgG), and adverse events. Randomized clinical trials will be collected, methodological quality will be evaluated using the Cochrane risk-of-bias assessment tool, and the level of evidence will be rated using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation approach. Meta-analysis will be performed using RevMan 5.3.0 software. The heterogeneity test will be conducted between the studies, and P < .1 and I(2) > 50% are the thresholds for the tests. We will utilize the fixed effects model or the random effects model according to the size of heterogeneity. RESULTS: Because the review is ongoing, no results can be reported. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this review will provide reliable evidence for effectiveness and safety of indirect moxibustion for treating AR. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval is not required for this study. This systematic review and meta-analysis will be disseminated online and on paper to help guide clinicians. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: CRD42019140944.