Evidence to Support the Use of Honey for Prevention of Oral Mucositis in Cancer Patients is Limited

Data sources 

PubMed, Medline, Embase, CINAHL via EBSCO and Cochrane library databases were searched.

Study selection
Randomised controlled trials that investigated the protective effects of honey in head and neck cancer patients undergoing radiation therapy that used either the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) or World Health Organisation (WHO) criteria for evaluating the severity of the radiation mucositis were included. Risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane methodology.

Data extraction and synthesis

A meta-analysis was conducted using a fixed-effects model. Heterogeneity was assessed using the I(2) statistic.

Results

Three randomised trials involving a total of 120 patients were included. The overall relative risk of developing mucositis was almost 80% lower (risk ratio, 0.19; 95% CI, 0.098 - 0.371) in the honey treatment group than in the control group.
Conclusions

Despite promising results, the weaknesses of the individual studies highlight the need for further, more rigorous, randomised controlled trials. Future studies need to address the weakness of available studies by adequately describing the method of randomisation and allocation concealment.