Table 3.
Summary of Findings. Question: Photobiomodulation compared to pharmacological intervention for patients with symptomatic oral lichen planus with or without associated skin lesions.
| Certainty Assessment | Nº of patients | Effect | Certainty | Importance | |||||||||
| Outcome | No. ofstudies | Studydesign | Risk ofbias | Inconsistency | Indirectness | Imprecision | Otherconsiderations | Photobiomodulation | Pharmacologicalintervention | Relative effect(95% CI) | Absolute effect(95% CI) | ||
| Recurrence | 3 | Randomizedtrials | Not serious | Not serious | Not serious | Not serious | None | 12/218 (5.5%) | 31/217 (14.3%) | RR 0.46(0.25 to 0.87) | 77 fewer per 1000(from 107 fewer to 19 fewer) | ⊕⊕⊕⊕High | CRITICAL |
| Healing | 5 | Randomizedtrials | Not serious | Very seriousᵃ | Not serious | Not serious | None | 201/572 (35.1%) | 117/574 (20.4%) | RR 1.78(1.22 to 2.59) | 159 more per 1000(from 45 more to 324 more) | ⊕⊕○○Low | CRITICAL |
| Anxiety | 2 | Randomizedtrials | Not serious | Seriousᵇ | Not serious | Seriousᶜ | None | -/207 | -/207 | SMD -0.12(-0.40 to 0.16) | Not estimable | ⊕⊕○○Low | IMPORTANT |
| Lichen Planus Scores | 7 | Randomizedtrials | Not serious | Seriousᵈ | Not serious | Seriousᵉ | None | -/780 | -/753 | SMD 0.03(-0.10 to 0.15) | Not estimable | ⊕⊕○○Low | IMPORTANT |
| VAS Scale | 13 | Randomizedtrials | Not serious | Seriousᶠ | Not serious | Not serious | None | -/945 | -/957 | SMD -0.23(-0.41 to -0.06) | Not estimable | ⊕⊕⊕○Moderate | CRITICAL |
CI: Confidence interval; RR: Risk ratio; SMD: Standardized mean difference.Explanations• a. Heterogeneity = 76%.• b. Heterogeneity = 50%.• c. Wide variation in confidence intervals across several time points.• d. Heterogeneity = 51%.• e. Several confidence intervals crossed the null effect.