Vaccines for the common cold | Figure 1

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Vaccines for the common cold

Common cold is caused by viral infection in the upper respiratory tract, and people usually get better when the virus dies. The effect of vaccines on preventing the common cold in healthy people is still unknown.

No new RCTs were included in this update. Only one RCT is included (low-quality evidence), involving 2307 healthy participants.

Need for well-designed, adequately powered RCTs to investigate vaccines for common cold.

Read the full Cochrane Review here

Cranberries for preventing urinary tract infections

What is the issue? Cranberries (as cranberry juice, tablets, or capsules) have been used for many years to prevent urinary tract infections (UTIs). Cranberries contain proanthocyanidins (PACs), substances that can prevent bacteria from sticking to the walls of the bladder. This may help reduce infections and medical appointments. However, there is currently no established regimen for what PACs dose to use and no formal regulation by health authorities of cranberry products. In particular, the dose suggested may not be included on the package.

What did we do? We analyzed the results of randomized controlled trials (RCTs), which compared the occurrence of UTIs in people taking a cranberry product with those taking a placebo or no treatment. We also analyzed RCTs comparing a cranberry product with other treatments such as antibiotics or probiotics.

What did we find? We found 50 RCTs involving 8857 people. Forty-five RCTs compared cranberry with a placebo or no treatment. Taking cranberries as a juice, tablets, or capsules reduced the number of UTIs in women with recurrent UTIs, children with UTIs, and people susceptible to UTIs following an intervention such as bladder radiotherapy. However, UTIs did not appear to be reduced in elderly institutionalized men and women, adults with neuromuscular bladder dysfunction and incomplete bladder emptying, or pregnant women. Few people reported side effects, with the most common being tummy pain. We did not find enough information to determine if cranberry products are more or less effective compared with antibiotics or probiotics in preventing further UTIs.

Conclusions Cranberry products may help to prevent UTIs which cause symptoms in women with frequent UTIs, children with UTIs, and people who have undergone interventions involving the bladder. However, further assessment is required in well-designed and prospectively registered RCTs to clarify further who with UTIs would benefit from cranberry products.

There is an absence of evidence for the effect of wearing gloves, gowns, or masks for contact with hospitalized people with MRSA, or with their environment, on the transmission of MRSA to other people.

A Cochrane review identified no eligible studies, either completed or ongoing.

Review question

Do treatments that help the body's immune system fight cancer cells (immunotherapy) make people with non‐small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who have had surgery or radiotherapy aimed at a cure live longer?

Background Many people with NSCLC, who have had surgery or radiotherapy to cure their cancer, eventually die because the cancer comes back, either in the chest or elsewhere in the body. Numerous trials have looked at whether immunotherapy helps people live longer, some indicating a benefit, others not.

Study characteristics We searched four computerized databases and five trial registers to 19 May 2021. We looked for all trials that randomly allocated participants to one treatment or another (randomized controlled trials, RCTs), including adults (aged 18 years or older) with early NSCLC (stages I to III), confirmed by laboratory testing of a sample of the tumor. We found 11 RCTs involving over 5000 participants who had received surgery or curative radiotherapy and were randomly allocated to receive either immunotherapy or no further treatment.

Key results We found that giving immunotherapy, mainly vaccine‐based (aiming to activate the host immune system to induce human immune response to tumor-specific antigens) after surgery or radiotherapy did not make people live longer. People receiving vaccine‐based immunotherapy did not experience more side effects than others. We did not find results indicating whether adding immunotherapy improved quality of life. Currently, there is no evidence supporting or refuting immunotherapy (mainly vaccine‐based) for localized NSCLC (stages I to III). Ongoing RCTs are testing new, more promising immunotherapy drugs (e.g., checkpoint inhibitors).

Quality of the evidence The evidence we found about overall survival and progression-free survival was of high and moderate quality, respectively. However, the evidence regarding how many participants lived to one, two, three, or five years was moderate or low quality due to RCTs being poorly conducted, yielding inconsistent results. Evidence for both any and severe adverse events was low quality.