Ashley 2004b THA.

Methods	Trial design: A RCT Follow‐up: Temperature and blood smears daily until clearance of fever and parasites, then weekly attendance until day 63 Adverse event monitoring: Adverse events defined as signs or symptoms that occurred or became more severe after treatment started. A subset of 55 patients in the DHA‐P group had full blood counts, urea, electrolyte, creatinine and liver function tests at days 0 and 7. Thirty‐two patients from the DHA‐P group also had ECG monitoring before and after treatment.
Participants	Number of participants: 355 Inclusion criteria: Age 1 to 65 yrs, symptomatic P. falciparum parasitaemia, informed consent Exclusion criteria: Pregnancy or lactation, signs or symptoms of severe malaria, > 4% of red blood cells parasitized, contraindication to mefloquine, treatment with mefloquine in the previous 60 days
Interventions	1. DHA‐P, fixed dose combination (Artekin: Holleykin) Total dose: 6 mg/kg DHA and 48 mg/kg P in 4 divided doses at 0, 8, 24, and 48 hrs 2. Artesunate plus mefloquine, loose combination (Artesunate: Guilin, Mequin: Atlantic) AS 4 mg/kg once daily for 3 days MQ 8 mg/kg once daily for 3 days All doses were supervised.
Outcomes	Cure rate at day 63, PCR‐adjusted and PCR‐unadjusted P. vivax during follow‐up, and mean time to reappearance Gametocyte development during follow‐up Mean haematocrit at days 0 and 7 Adverse events Not included in this review: Fever clearance time Parasite clearance time
Notes	Country: Thailand Setting: Four clinics on the Thai‐Myanmar border Transmission: Unstable low and seasonal transmission Resistance: Multiple‐drug resistance Dates: Jul 2002 to Apr 2003 Funding: Wellcome Trust of Great Britain
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Low risk	"The randomisation was computer generated (STATA; version 7; Statacorp)". Randomized in blocks of 9.
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	Unclear risk	"The treatment allocation was concealed in sealed envelopes labelled with the study code", unclear if these were sequentially numbered or opaque.
Blinding for microscopy outcomes (performance bias and detection bias)	Low risk	"Laboratory staff reading the blood smears had no knowledge of the treatment received".
Blinding for adverse events (performance and detection bias)	Unclear risk	No other blinding described.
Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes	Low risk	Similar losses to follow‐up in all groups (12.8% DHA‐P versus 13.6% AS+MQ).
Selective reporting (reporting bias)	Low risk	All WHO outcomes reported.
Other bias	Low risk	No other sources of bias identified.