Evaluation of a Persian Natural Topical Medicine Based on Sesame Oil on Mild-to-Moderate Outpatient Coronavirus Disease-19 Patients: A Randomized Triple-Blind Placebo-Controlled Clinical Trial

Sesame oil (SO) or so-called Tahini has been traditionally used for management of various conditions including burns and wounds and relief of pain, fever, and inflammation n Persian Medicine. It poses anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and anti-carcinogenic activities; then it could be used in various inflammatory conditions. A triple-blind randomized placebo-controlled clinical trial was carried out to examine the efficacy of a Persian natural topical medicine based on sesame oil in outpatients suffering mild and moderate coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19). The participants were 101 COVID-19 patients who met the inclusion criteria. The participants were allocated randomly to treatment (n = 51) group who received topical Sesame oil formulation five times daily on the chest and back skin for 1 week or the placebo (n = 50) group. The symptoms were examined at admittance and over a follow-up course and the results were compared in the two groups after 3 and 7 days. After three days, fever (7.84 vs. 20.41%, P=0.05), chills (3.92 vs. 16.33%, P=0.03), cough (severe 0 vs. 8.6, intermediate 50.98 vs. 65.31%, P=0.007) and headache (mild 7.84 vs. 30.61, moderate 5.88 vs. 0, P=0.004) had a significant lower prevalence in the treatment group. However, after 7 days, all symptoms had insignificant difference between two groups (P 0.05). No significant adverse reaction reported in both groups. As the results indicated, topical formulation consisting of sesame oil and cow butter, rubbing on the chest and back of the mild-to-moderate COVID-19 patients five times daily could significantly improve cough, fever, chills and headache, in 3 days. But it could not be effective on final outcome of the patients. More works covering a larger sample size are needed.