Table 3.

Reporting quality of key methodological items (n = 63)

Item	Criteria	Description	Number of positive trials	%	Cohen’s к coefficient	95% CI
8	Randomization	Description of the method used to generate the random sequence	19	30	0.79	0.63 to 0.95
9 and 10	Allocation concealment and implementation	Description of the method used to implement the random allocation sequence assuring the concealment until interventions are assigned	2	3	1.00	1.00
11	Blinding	Whether or not participants, those administering the interventions, or those assessing the outcomes were blinded to group assignment	6	10	0.91	0.75 to 1.08
15	Baseline data	An outline of baseline demographic and clinical characteristics of each group	13	21	0.68	0.47 to 0.89
16	Intent-to-treat analysis	No. of participants in each group included in each analysis and whether it was done by “intention to treat”	5	8	0.82	0.57 to 1.07