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Review
. 2022 Sep 24;23(19):11267.
doi: 10.3390/ijms231911267.

Efficacy and Safety of Ginger on the Side Effects of Chemotherapy in Breast Cancer Patients: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Soo-Dam Kim  1   2 , Eun-Bin Kwag  1   3 , Ming-Xiao Yang  2 , Hwa-Seung Yoo  4
Affiliations
Review

Efficacy and Safety of Ginger on the Side Effects of Chemotherapy in Breast Cancer Patients: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Soo-Dam Kim et al. Int J Mol Sci. .

Abstract

Cancer is one of the leading causes of death in the world, with breast cancer being the most prevalent cancer. Chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting (CINV) is one of the most serious side effects of chemotherapy. Because the current CINV treatment option has several flaws, alternative treatment options are required. Ginger has traditionally been used to treat nausea and vomiting, and it also has anticancer properties in breast cancer cells. Based on these findings, researchers investigated whether using ginger to treat CINV in breast cancer patients is both effective and safe. We searched PubMed, Embase, Cochrane Library, CNKI, and Wanfang from inception to June 2022. Outcomes included Rhodes Index Scores of Nausea, Vomiting, and Retching, severity and frequency of CINV. Five RCTs were included. We pooled all included data and performed subgroup analysis by types of CINV. Overall, authors found that ginger was associated with a reduction in CINV. Subgroup and sensitivity analysis revealed that managing severity of acute CINV in breast cancer patients with ginger was efficient. In terms of managing delayed CINV in breast cancer patients, ginger was also statistically significant. The authors concluded that ginger may be helpful in lowering both acute and delayed CINV in breast cancer patients. Since there were no serious side effects, ginger is thought to be safe.

Keywords: breast cancer; chemotherapy; chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting; ginger; side-effect; zingiber officinale.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Flow diagram of study selection.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Risk of bias associated with included trials [23,24,25,26,27].
Figure 3
Figure 3
Forest plot of acute CINV severity managements in ginger intake versus controls. CI: confidence interval; SD: standard deviation [24,25,26].
Figure 4
Figure 4
Forest plot of delayed CINV severity managements in ginger intake versus controls. CI: confidence interval; SD: standard deviation [24,25,26].
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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