Two ingredients commonly used in cough syrup are no better than sugar water in suppressing night-time coughing in children, according to a study published on Monday.
The study, titled "Effect of Dextromethorphan, Diphenhydramine, and Placebo on Nocturnal Cough and Sleep Quality for Coughing Children and Their Parents," was published in the July 2004 issue of Pediatrics.
In the evening of the day the parents were questioned the children were given either one of the commercial preparations or an inert placebo - in this case simple syrup. "There was a significant improvement for all symptoms over the previous night," Paul said.
"All three groups, including the non-medicated syrup group, showed dramatic improvement, with scores for cough frequency, impact on child and parent sleep, bothersome nature of cough, and severity of cough scoring lower," Paul said. "Neither dextromethorphan nor diphenhydramine was superior to placebo for any outcomes studied in this trial."
Not only was there no significant improvement for the children who took cough medicines with the active ingredients, but in the cough frequency category, those who received placebo reported a 2.24-point improvement in cough frequency, whereas the parents of those who took the medicines with active ingredients reported only a 1.97-point improvement.
He also notes that dextromethorphan has become a drug of abuse among adolescents.
