Expert review of clinical pharmacology
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Expert Rev Clin Pharmacol · Jul 2010
Combination of arginine and omega-3 fatty acids enteral nutrition in critically ill and surgical patients: a meta-analysis.
Immunonutrients may improve outcomes in critically ill and surgical patients. The objective of this meta-analysis was to determine if the combination of arginine and omega-3 fatty acids impacts infection rate, hospital length of stay and mortality in critically ill or surgical patients. In total, 23 studies met all of the criteria. ⋯ Infection rate and length of stay were significantly lower in patients receiving immunonutrition compared with the control group. In a subgroup analysis, these differences were maintained in the pre- and post-operative populations, but were not significant in the critically ill population. Mortality was not significantly different between the immunonutrition and control groups.