Clinical effects of piribedil in adjuvant treatment of Parkinson’s Disease: A meta-analysis

Objective. To evaluate the clinical effects of piribedil in adjuvant treatment of Parkinson’s Disease (PD) by pooling previously openly published studies. Methods. The related electronic databases of Medline (1960~2017.5), Cochrane central register of controlled trials (CENTRAL), EMBASE (1980~2017.5) and Wanfang (1986~20175.5) were searched by two reviewers (Lu Peihua and Wang Jianqian) independently for publications including the topic of prospective randomized controlled trials about clinical effects of piribedil in adjuvant treatment of PD. The data of each included study was extracted and pooled by Stata11.0 software (for meta-analysis). The statistical heterogeneity across the studies was evaluated by I2 test and the publication bias was calculated by begg’s funnel plot and Egger’s line regression test. Results. After searching the related electronic databases of Medline, CENTRAL, EMBSE and Wanfang databases, 11 clinical studies were included in this meta-analysis. The pooled RR (random effect model) of clinical efficacy was 1.29 (95%CI:1.18~1.41, P=4×10-3) indicating the clinical efficacy of piribedil group was signficat higher than those of control group. The standard mean difference (SMD) for UPDRS score changed before and after treatment was pooled by random effect model. The combined SMD was -0.41 (95%CI:-0.75~-0.06). For piribedil related side effects, the combined data indicated that there was no statistical difference for nausea and vomiting (RR=0.43, 95%CI:0.41~1.69, P=0.61), mental disorders (RR=0.85, 95%CI:0.45~1.59, P=0.61) and other toxicities (RR=0.32, 95%CI:0.09~1.16, P=0.08). Conclusion. Piribedil combined with Levodopa in adjuvant treatment of PD is more effective than Levodopa alone without increasing the drug related toxicity