Table 1.

Characteristics of included studies

Study	Country	No. of centres	Bismuth compound used1	Duration of bismuth therapy (days)	Total dose (mg/d) used	Method of collection of adverse event data	Generation of randomization schedule provided	Method of concealment of allocation provided	Double-blind
Bujanda 2001[15]	Spain and Portugal	Multi-centre	RBC	7	800	Unclear	Yes	No	Yes
Burette 1992[16]	Belgium	1	CBS	10	480	Unclear	No	No	No
Buzas 2001[17]	Hungary	1	RBC	7	800	Unclear	No	No	No
Carpintero 1997[18]	Spain	1	CBS	42	480	Unclear	Yes	No	No
Carvalho 1998[19]	Brazil	1	BSN	14	1200	Unclear	No	No	No
Catalano 2000[20]	Italy	1	RBC	10	800	Questionnaire	Yes	No	Yes
Chuang 2001[22]	Taiwan	1	RBC	7	800	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Dal Bo 1998[23]	Italy	1	TDB	14	480	Unclear	No	No	No
Danese 2001[24]	Italy	1	RBC	7	800	Validated questionnaire	No	No	No
Eberhardt 1990[25]	Germany	4	BSS	28	1800	Unclear	No	No	No
Fakheri 2004[26]	Iran	1	CBS	14	480	Unclear	Yes	No	No
Forne 1995[27]	Spain	1	CBS	7	480	Diary cards	No	Yes	No
Gasbarrini 2000[28]	Italy	1	RBC	7	800	Validated questionnaire	No	No	No
Georgopoulos 1999[29]	Greece	3	RBC	7	800	Unclear	No	No	No
Gisbert 2000[30]	Spain	1	RBC	7	800	Unclear	Yes	No	No
Graham 1998[31]	USA	111	RBC	28	800	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Hung 2002[32]	Hong Kong	3	RBC	7	800	Diary	Yes	Yes	No
Lanza 1989[33]	USA	1	BSS	21	2100	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Lanza 1998[34]	USA	47	RBC	28	800	Diary cards	No	No	Yes
Liu 1999[35]	China	1	TDB	7	480	Diary	No	No	No
Mao 2000[36]	Vietnam	1	RBC	10	400	Diary	No	No	No
Marshall 1988[7]	Australia	1	CBS	56	480	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Masci 1995[37]	Italy	1	CBS	28 to 56	480	Unclear	Yes	No	Yes
Nafeeza 1992[38]	Malaysia	1	CBS	28	480	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Pare 1999[39]	Multi-national	Multi-centre	RBC	28	800	Unclear	Yes	No	Yes
Perri 2002[40]	Italy	1	RBC	7	800	Questionnaire	No	No	No
Peterson 1996[41]	USA	38	RBC	28	800	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Rokkas 1988[42]	UK	1	CBS	56	480	Unclear	No	No	Yes
Spadaccini 1998[43]	Italy	1	RBC	7	800	Face-to-face interview	No	No	No
Spiliadis 1998[44]	Greece	3	CBS	14	1200	Unclear	No	No	No
Spinzi 2000[45]	Italy	6	RBC	7	800	Face-to-face interview	No	No	No
Sung 1998[46]	Hong Kong	1	RBC	7	800	Telephone interview	No	No	No
Whitehead 2000[47]	UK	1	CBS and BSN	28	Unclear	Unclear	Yes	Yes	Yes
Wong 2001[48]	Hong Kong	1	RBC	7	800	Diary	Yes	Yes	No
Xiao 2001[21]	China	Multi-centre	CBS	7	480	Diary	No	No	No

¹BSN: Bismuth subnitrate; BSS: Bismuth subsalicylate; CBS: Colloidal bismuth subcitrate; RBC: Ranitidine bismuth citrate; TDB: Tripotassium dictrato bismuthate.