Table 1.

Quality assessment of included trials

Author	randomisation sequence	allocation concealment	Assessor blind	Patient blind	Loss to follow up at trial end	Intention to treat	Quality score
Abt et al [21]	No	No	Yes	Yes	11%	No	3
Buch et al [27]	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	4%	No	5
Buchbinder et al [10]	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	6%	Yes	5
Cosentino et al [33]	No	No	Yes	Not stated	Not stated	No	1
Haake et al [11]	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	16%	Yes	6
Krischek et al [22]	No	No	No	Not stated	6%	No	1
Ogden et al [28]	No	No	Yes	Yes	1.5%	No	3
Rompe et al [32]	No	No	Yes	Yes	16%	No	3
Rompe et al [30]	No	No	No	Yes	Not stated	No	1
Rompe et al [31]	No	No	Yes	Yes	20%	No	3
Speed et al [12]	No	No	Yes	Yes	14%	Yes	4