Antiemetic activity of ginger in children receiving cancer chemotherapy

الملخص EN

Objective: To evaluate the antiemetic effect of ginger versus metoclopramide in children receiving cancer chemotherapy. Methods: A sample of 50 patients aged 6–14 years attending the Haematooncology unit in Ibn Al–Atheer Children's Teaching Hospital in Mosul city and receiving chemotherapy for their malignancies were included.

They were randomly subdivided into 2 groups and received different types of treatment including ginger and metoclopramide.

Results: The study showed that cancer was more common in female than in male with male to female ratio 0.85 / 1.

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia was the most common type of cancer and constituted 60% of the cases and it revealed that response rate was higher in those treated by ginger compared to metoclopramide (72% and 32% respectively); response was found to be higher in males than in females (86.6% and 50% respectively).

Conclusions: Nausea and vomiting are common problems in children receiving chemotherapy.

Ginger (Zingiber officinale) appears to be promising in controlling these problems.