Table 2. Details of the calculations for the proportion of global symptom relief.

Antidepressants	Study(First Author and year of publication)	The definition criteria for the calculation of proportion of global symptom relief				Treatment Group	Treatment Group	Control Group	Control Group
						Improved	Total	Improved	Total
TCAs	Myren J 1982	A feeling of well-being. After therapy, IBS patients were divided into three groups (ie. improved, unchanged and worse) and the result was calculated as the proportion of the improved group.				25	30	21	31
	Drossman 2003	Global well-being (“how would you rate your general well-being”) scored on a Likert scale from 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent) and was calculated according to the proportion of “good, very good and excellent”.				55	115	21	57
	Vahedi 2008	Calculated the proportion of the absence of all symptoms.				17	27	7	27
	Talley NJ 2008	Calculated the proportion of “adequate relief over 50% in a week”.				10	18	9	16
	Abdul-Baki H 2009	Assessed by asking the following question: “Have your symptoms improved satisfactorily since starting the drug study?” The result was calculated as per to the proportion of the improved group.				25	59	12	48
SSRIs	Kuiken SD 2003	Assessed by asking the following question: “Please consider how you felt during the past 2 weeks in regard to your irritable bowel syndrome. Compared to the way you felt before entering the study, how would you rate your relief of symptoms during the past 2 weeks?”. Possible answers were relieved, unchanged, or worse. The result was calculated as per to the proportion of the relieved group				10	19	9	21
	Creed F 2003	After therapy, IBS patients were divided into three groups (ie. improved, same and worse) and the result was calculated as per to the proportion of the improved group				49	86	30	86
	Talley NJ 2008	Calculated the proportion of “adequate relief over 50% in a week”				8	17	9	16
	Masand PS 2009	The responders were defined as subjects with clinical global impression–improvement (CGI–I) scores of 1 or 2 at the end of treatment The result was calculated as per to the proportion of the responders.				25	36	6	36
	Ladabaum U 2010	Overall response was defined as achieving self-reported weekly “adequate relief” for at least three of the last 6 weeks. The result was calculated as per to the proportion of the responders.				12	27	15	27