Systematic review and meta-analysis showed that complementary and alternative medicines were not effective for infantile colic

Abstract

Aim: Osteopathy and chiropractic techniques are used for babies for different reasons, but it is unclear how effective they are. The aim of this study was to evaluate their effectiveness in reducing crying time and increasing sleeping time in babies with infantile colic.

Methods: A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted on infantile colic studies that used complementary and alternative medicine techniques as interventions. The outcome measures were hours spent crying and/or sleeping. We used the PubMed, Physiotherapy Evidence Database, Cochrane Library, Embase, Web of Science, Scopus, Osteopathic Medicine Digital Database and Google Scholar databases from inception to 11 November 2022.

Results: The methodological quality of the randomised control trials ranged from fair to high. We focused on five studies with 422 babies. Complementary treatments failed to decrease the crying time (mean difference -1.08, 95% CI: -2.17 to 0.01, I² = 92%) and to increase sleeping time (mean difference 1.11, 95% CI: -0.20 to 2.41; I² : 91%), compared with no intervention. The quality of the evidence was rated as very low for both outcome measures.

Conclusion: Osteopathy and chiropractic treatment failed to reduce the crying time and increase sleeping time in babies with infantile colic, compared with no additional intervention.

Keywords: chiropractic; colic; complementary therapies; infant; osteopathy.