A retrospective study of Reyanning mixture in elderly patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant

Changya Liu; Xinxin Wu; Hongqiang Yang; Xiangru Xu; Caiyu Chen; Linguangjin Wu; Wen Zhang; Haimei Shi; Yuerong Fei; Yuting Sun; Hongze Wu; Shuang Zhou; Bangjiang Fang

doi:10.3389/fphar.2023.1185122

A retrospective study of Reyanning mixture in elderly patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant

Front Pharmacol. 2023 Jul 20:14:1185122. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2023.1185122. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Changya Liu¹, Xinxin Wu², Hongqiang Yang¹, Xiangru Xu¹, Caiyu Chen¹, Linguangjin Wu¹, Wen Zhang¹, Haimei Shi¹, Yuerong Fei¹, Yuting Sun¹, Hongze Wu³, Shuang Zhou⁴, Bangjiang Fang^{1

5}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Emergency, LongHua Hospital, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai, China.
² Shanghai Skin Disease Hospital, Tongji University Skin Disease Hospital, Shanghai, China.
³ Jiangxi Provincial Traditional Chinese Medicine Nephropathy Clinical Research Center, Jiujiang Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Jiujiang, Jiangxi, China.
⁴ Acupuncture and Massage College, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai, China.
⁵ Institute of Emergency and Critical Care Medicine, Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai, China.

Abstract

Objective: Reyanning mixture has been demonstrated to be effective in treating infected patients during the outbreak pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in Shanghai 2022. The aim of this study is to further investigate the role of Reyanning mixture specifically in the treatment of elderly patients. Methods: This study enrolled 1,102 elderly patients who were infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant. Of these, 291 patients received Reyanning mixture in conjunction with conventional Western medicine treatment were assigned to the treatment group, while 811 patients only received conventional Western medicine treatment were assigned to the control group. Clinical parameters including hospitalization duration, viral shedding time, and Cycle Threshold (Ct) values of novel coronavirus nucleic acid tests, as well as adverse events were recorded and analyzed in both groups. Results: There was no significant difference in baseline characteristics between two groups. In comparison to the control group, the treatment group demonstrated a substantial difference in hospitalization duration (median: 8 days vs. 10 days, HR: 0.638, 95% CI: 0.558-0.731, p < 0.001). The treatment group also showed a significantly shorter viral shedding time compared to the control group (median: 7 days vs. 8 days, HR: 0.754, 95% CI: 0.659-0.863, p < 0.001). Multivariate Cox proportional-hazards model analysis indicated that the use of Reyanning mixture was closely associated with a reduction in hospitalization duration (HR: 1.562, 95% CI: 1.364-1.789, p < 0.001) and viral shedding time (HR: 1.335, 95% CI: 1.166-1.528, p < 0.001). In addition, during the treatment process, no serious adverse event occurred in either group. Conclusion: The improvement of clinical parameters in the treatment group indicate a promising therapeutic benefit of Reyanning mixture for elderly patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant in the present study. Further investigations are required to validate this finding by examining the underlying mechanism and function of Reyanning mixture.

Keywords: COVID-19; Omicron variant; Reyanning mixture; elderly patients; hospitalization duration; viral shedding time.

Grants and funding

This study was supported by the Emergency research project of World Federation of Chinese Medicine Societies (SZL-2022YI010).