This uncommissioned systematic review was subject to full peer-review.
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Systematic Review
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Systematic review: Coca-Cola can effectively dissolve gastric phytobezoars as a first-line treatment
Article first published online: 17 DEC 2012
DOI: 10.1111/apt.12141
© 2012 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
Additional Information
How to Cite
Ladas, S. D., Kamberoglou, D., Karamanolis, G., Vlachogiannakos, J. and Zouboulis-Vafiadis, I. (2013), Systematic review: Coca-Cola can effectively dissolve gastric phytobezoars as a first-line treatment. Alimentary Pharmacology & Therapeutics, 37: 169–173. doi: 10.1111/apt.12141
Publication History
- Issue published online: 17 DEC 2012
- Article first published online: 17 DEC 2012
- Manuscript Accepted: 24 OCT 2012
- Manuscript Revised: 20 OCT 2012
- Manuscript Revised: 18 SEP 2012
- Manuscript Received: 2 SEP 2012
Summary
Background
Gastric phytobezoars represent the most common bezoars in patients with poor gastric motility. A variety of dissolution therapies and endoscopic fragmentation techniques have been evaluated as conservative treatment so as to avoid surgery.
Aim
To investigate the effectiveness of Coca-Cola for gastric phytobezoars dissolution.
Methods
We performed a systematic search to identify publications on gastric phytobezoars to assess the efficacy of Coca-Cola as a dissolution therapy. Diospyrobezoars, formed after persimmon ingestion, are a distinct type of phytobezoars characterized by their hard consistency. Thus, these two subgroups of bezoars were compared in terms of successful dissolution.
Results
Over a 10-year period (2002–2012), 24 papers including 46 patients have been published. In 91.3% of the cases, phytobezoar resolution with Coca-Cola administration was successful, either as a single treatment (50%) or combined with further endoscopic techniques, whereas only 4 patients underwent surgery. Phytobezoars were more likely to dissolve after initial attempt with Coca-Cola compared with diospyrobezoars (60.6% vs. 23%, P = 0.022).
Conclusions
Coca-Cola alone is effective in gastric phytobezoar dissolution in half of the cases and, combined with additional endoscopic methods, is successful in more than 90% of them.