Vitamin C and the common cold: a retrospective analysis of Chalmers' review [in Chinese]
Description
Chinese translation of DOI 10.1080/07315724.1995.10718483 PMID
Abstract
In 1975 Thomas Chalmers analyzed the possible effect of vitamin C on the common cold by calculating the average difference in the duration of cold episodes in vitamin C and control groups in seven placebo-controlled studies. He found that episodes were 0.11 +/- 0.24 (SE) days shorter in the vitamin C groups and concluded that there was no valid evidence to indicate that vitamin C is beneficial in the treatment of the common cold. Chalmers' review has been extensively cited in scientific articles and monographs. However, other reviewers have concluded that vitamin C significantly alleviates the symptoms of the common cold. A careful analysis of Chalmers' review reveals serious shortcomings. For example, Chalmers did not consider the amount of vitamin C used in the studies and included in his meta-analysis was a study in which only 0.025-0.05 g/day of vitamin C was administered to the test subjects. For some studies Chalmers used values that are inconsistent with the original published results. Using data from the same studies, we calculated that vitamin C (1-6 g/day) decreased the duration of the cold episodes by 0.93 +/- 0.22 (SE) days; the relative decrease in the episode duration was 21%. The current notion that vitamin C has no effect on the common cold seems to be based in large part on a faulty review written two decades ago.
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Additional details
Related works
- Continues
- Journal article: 10.5281/zenodo.6469713 (DOI)
- Is supplement to
- Journal article: 10.1080/07315724.1995.10718483 (DOI)
- Journal article: 10138/42358 (Handle)
- Is supplemented by
- Journal article: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/pmc8078152/ (URL)
- Thesis: https://helda.helsinki.fi/handle/10138/20335 (URL)