Abstract
AIMS: A meta-analysis was performed to compare the therapeutic outcomes in patients treated for heart failure (HF) with recombinant human brain natriuretic peptide (rhBNP) and dobutamine. METHODS: PubMed, Embase and the Chinese Biomedical Database were exhaustively searched to identify studies relevant to this meta-analysis. Eight cohort studies were found suitable for inclusion. Data regarding trial validity, methodological processes and clinical outcomes were extracted. RESULTS: Patients treated with rhBNP showed statistically significant reduction of in-hospital mortality and re-admission rates compared with the dobutamine treated patient group (both P < 0.05). Further, the rhBNP treated patient group showed higher survival outcomes, compared with dobutamine treated patients, when the post-treatment follow-up period was longer than 6 months (P < 0.05). Stratified analysis based on ethnicity showed a dramatic decrease of in-hospital mortality among mixed race HF patients receiving rhBNP treatment (P < 0.05), but such decreases were not statistically significant in Asian and Caucasian populations (both P > 0.05). On the other hand, re-admission rates were significantly lower in rhBNP treated Caucasian and mixed race populations (both P < 0.05). Notably, in rhBNP treated group, dose levels of 0.015 and 0.03 incrementally lowered the re-admission rates, displaying dose effect, and the re-admission rates at both rhBNP doses were significantly lower than the dobutamine treated group (both P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Our meta-analysis results suggested that rhBNP therapy is associated with lower in-hospital mortality and re-admission rates in HF patients compared to the dobutamine regimen. Nevertheless, large scale prospective, randomized trials are necessary to confirm these findings.