Search Results and Study Characteristics
A total of 1059 articles were retrieved from medical databases, American College of Cardiology 2014 and European Society of Cardiology 2020. Among them, 1018 articles were identified by reading the title and abstract, and 41 articles were identified by reading the full text. Finally, ten randomized controlled trials involving 61065 patients with CAD (32227 patients receiving anti-inflammatory therapy, and 28937 patients without receiving anti-inflammatory therapy) are included (Figure 1). The baseline characteristics of the included trials are shown (Table 1). Four trials involved Colchicine [7,9,21-22]. Three of them were Colchicine compared with placebo, and one was compared with those without Colchicine. In addition, four trials compared PLA2 inhibitors [14-16,23], of which three compared Varespladib, one compared Darapladib. The remaining two trials compared low-dose Canakinumab and Methotrexate with placebo, respectively [11,24]. Meanwhile, seven of them included patients with acute coronary syndrome and three recruited patients with chronic coronary syndrome. The duration of follow-up in the trials ranged from six months to four years. The baseline characteristics of patients are shown (Table 2).
The Primary Outcome
Six trials reported data of the primary outcome, the result shows that the incidence of primary outcome in patients receiving anti-inflammatory therapy was significantly lower than that in patients without receiving anti-inflammatory therapy (10.66% vs 10.86%, RR 0.93, 0. 89-0.98, P = 0.006, I2 = 34%, P Heterogeneity = 0.18) (Figure 2).
The Secondary Outcomes
Nine randomized controlled trials provided the risk of MI in patients with CAD. Compared with patients without receiving anti-inflammatory therapy, the anti-inflammatory therapy can significantly reduce the risk of MI (5.66% vs 6.03%, RR 0.90, 0.84-0.96, P = 0.002, I2 = 32%, P heterogeneity = 0.17) (Figure 3A). Meanwhile, the meta-analysis of seven trials displays that the incidence of coronary revascularization in patients receiving anti-inflammatory therapy was significantly lower than that in patients without receiving anti-inflammatory therapy (1.94% vs.2.66%, RR 0.74, 0.66-0.84, P < 0.00001, I2 = 34%, Pheterogeneity = 0.17) (Figure 3B). Furthermore, the risk of cardiovascular death was reported in eight trials. The result demonstrates that the risk of cardiovascular death was similar between the two groups (3.05% vs 3.06%, RR 0.93, 0.85-1.02, P= 0.12, I2 = 0%, Pheterogeneity = 0.72) (Figure 3C). In addition, there is no significant difference both in the risk of all-cause death (6.13% vs 5.61%, RR 1.00, 0.93-1.06, P = 0.88, I2 = 3%, Pheterogeneity = 0.40) (Figure 3D) and stroke (1.58% vs 1.56%, RR 0.94, 0.83-1.07, P=0.36, I2=28%, Pheterogeneity=0.19) (Figure 3E) between the two groups.
Subgroup Analysis
According to the Mendelian randomization data, anti-inflammatory drugs were divided into two categories [25]. Six of ten trials use anti-inflammatory drugs targeting the central IL-6 inflammatory signaling pathway and the other four apply PLA2 inhibitors (Figure 4). The subgroup analysis shows that compared with patients without receiving anti-inflammatory therapy, the anti-inflammatory drugs targeting the central IL-6 inflammatory signaling pathway can reduce the risk of the primary outcome (10.7% vs 10.1%, RR 0.88 0.81-0.96, P = 0.003, I2 =34%, Pheterogeneity =0.21). Instead, there was no significant difference in the risk of the primary outcome between the two groups in patients with PLA2 inhibitors therapy (10.2% vs 9.8%, RR 0.96 0.90-1.03, P = 0.24, I2 =0%, Pheterogeneity =0.44). However, there are not differences in the risk of the primary outcome between the two groups (I2 = 59.8%, P interaction = 0.11) (Figure 4A). In addition, there is a significantly difference in the risk of MI between the two groups in the IL-6 pathway subgroup (5.6% vs 5.9%, RR 0.85, 0.77-0.94, P = 0.002, I2 =38%, Pheterogeneity = 0.16), but not in the PLA2 inhibitors subgroup (6.0% vs 6.0%, RR 0.94, 0.86-1.02, P = 0.15, I2 =0%, Pheterogeneity = 0.42), and the differences between the two groups is not statistically significant (I2 = 51.5%, P interaction = 0.15) (Figure 4B). The result of subgroup analysis shows that the drugs targeting the central IL-6 inflammatory signaling pathway can also reduce the incidence of coronary revascularization (2.1% vs 3.3%, RR 0.69, 0.59-0.80, P < 0.00001, I2 =32%, Pheterogeneity = 0.21). However, there is no significant difference between the two groups in patients with PLA2 inhibitors therapy (1.6% vs 1.8%, RR 0.89, 0.71-1.13, P=0.35, I2 =0%, Pheterogeneity = 0.94), and the differences between the two groups is not statistically significant (I2 = 70.1%, P interaction =0.07) (Figure 4C). Besides, there is no significant difference in the risk of cardiovascular death, all-cause death and stroke between the two groups from the use of the two anti-inflammatory drugs (Figure 4D-F). Finally, subgroup analysis of the targeting the central IL-6 inflammatory signaling pathway shows that Colchicine was more effective than Methotrexate and Canakinumab in reducing ischemic stroke (0.4% vs 0.8%, RR 0.46, 0.28-0.74, P = 0.002, I2 =0%, Pheterogeneity = 0.39), and the differences between the two groups is statistically significant (I2 = 85.3%, P interaction =0.009) (Figure 5A), and both groups can significantly reduce the risk of the primary outcome, MI and coronary revascularization, but there are not statistically significant (Figure 5B-D).
Trial Sequential Analysis, Assessment of quality and Publication Bias
Trial sequential analysis is performed for each outcome (Supplementary Figure 1). The curve of the primary outcome, MI and coronary revascularization exceeded the traditional boundary and the trial sequential analysis boundary. However, the curve of cardiovascular death and stroke did not reach the traditional boundary and expected sample size. The sample size of All-cause death was too small, and the graph generation failed. The risk of bias assessment shows that there was a high risk of bias in performance and attrition (Supplementary Figure 2). The funnel plot shows that the distribution was symmetrical for each outcome, which means no publication bias (Supplementary Figure 3A-F). The P value of other outcomes are more than 0.05 except for all-cause death (Egger’s = 0.04) and stroke (Egger’s = 0.023) (Supplementary Figure 4A-F). The quality of GRADE evidence for the primary outcome, MI, coronary revascularization and stroke is moderate, while the quality of evidence for cardiovascular death and all-cause death outcomes is high (Supplementary Table 2).