What's the evidence for eletriptan?

The evidence that eletriptan works for migraine attacks is good. We found a big summary of the evidence (known as a systematic review) and six further studies (which were randomised controlled trials).^{1 2 3 4 5 6 7}

The summary included 10 studies of eletriptan. These were all high-quality studies. Some of the studies compared eletriptan to a dummy treatment (a placebo). Other studies compared eletriptan to another triptan drug called sumatriptan.

Here is a summary of what we found.

• Eletriptan is better than a placebo at relieving pain and getting rid of migraines.¹
• Higher doses worked for more people, but were more likely to cause side effects.¹
• Higher doses of eletriptan worked better than sumatriptan.^{1 2 4}
• Eletriptan works better than a drug that's called ergotamine and caffeine.¹

One big summary of the research (a systematic review) looked at all the triptan drugs available at the time (in 2007). They looked at 221 studies in total and selected 38 good-quality studies. The researchers said all triptans worked better than a placebo at reducing pain or getting rid of migraines within two hours. But only sumatriptan and rizatriptan worked better than a placebo drug within half an hour.⁸

For more details:

Read this information about the treatment in Clinical Evidence