Comparison of the effects of left atrial appendage closure and oral anticoagulants in preventing stroke in patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation: A protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: This study aims to analyze and evaluate the difference in efficacy between left atrial appendage closure (LAAC) and oral anticoagulants (OA) in preventing stroke in patients with non-valvular atrial fibrillation (NVAF) through the method of meta-analysis. The purpose is to provide for the prevention of stroke in patients with NVAF valuable treatment guidance. METHODS: This study is a comprehensive collection of randomized controlled studies of LAAC and OA in the prevention of stroke in patients with NVAF, and searches PubMed, Embase, the Cochrane Library, Web of Science, CNKI, SinoMed, VIP Database, WANFANG Database, and other Chinese and English databases by combining subject words with free words, and the retrieval time is from the establishment of each database to June 1, 2021. At the same time, searching the included literature and literature of related reviews by manual. Two researchers independently conduct literature screening and quality evaluation. Statistical software RevMan 5.3 and Stata 12.0 were used for meta-analysis. RESULTS: This study evaluating the difference in efficacy between LAAC and OA in preventing stroke in patients with NVAF will be published in high-quality medical academic journals. CONCLUSION: This study will give the best treatment strategy to prevent stroke in patients with NVAF, and provide some reference for clinical medical staff. OSF registration number: DOI 10.17605/OSF.IO/2UXPA (https://osf.io/2uxpa).