Table 2.

Patient characteristics of the included studies.

Study	N total	N intervention (I)	N controls (C)	Age (years)	Gender m/f	Mean follow-up (moths)
McKee et al. 2010 [19]	30	15	15	44.1 (I) 45.6 (C)	11/4 (I) 10/5 (C)	38 (26–60)
Gitelis and Brebach 2002 [20]	6	6	0	50	3/3	28 (12–84)
von Stechow et al. 2005 [21]	16	16	0	? (38–85)	13/3	? (12–48)
Chang et al. 2007 [22]	65	25	40	39.8 (18–69)	36/29	75 (36–344)
Tsai et al. 2004 [23]	2	2	0	54 (80–28)	2/0	36
von Stechow and Rauschmann 2009 [24]	12	12	0	59 (39–74)	8/4	? (12–?)
Berner et al. 2008 [25]	1	1	0	49	1/0	24
Drago et al. 2013 [26]	27	27	0	44 (20–80)	18/9	17.8 (9–30)
Lindfors et al. 2010 [27]	11	11	0	? (16–84)	9/2	24 (10–38)
McAndrew et al. 2013 [28]	3	3	0	44.7 (26–68)	2/1	17.3 (14–21)
Romanò et al. 2014 [29]	76	27	49	45.2 (19–80)	49/27	21.8 (12–36)
Fleiter et al. 2014 [30]	20	20	0	51.1 (24–79)	16/4	?
Ferguson et al. 2014 [31]	193	193	0	46.1 (16–82)	150/43	44.4 (15.6–81.2)
Humm et al. 2014 [32]	21	21	0	49 (26–88)	18/3	16 (6–25)
Franceschini et al. 2012 [33]	1	1	0	32	1/0	12