Table 1.

General characteristics of the included randomised controlled trials (n=200)

	Overall
	n (%)*
Number of trial authors; median (IQR)	9 (6–14)†
Paper is the first full-text report of the trial findings	171 (86%)
Classification of the income level of the country in which the first author’s institution is located:
High income	179 (90%)
Upper middle income	15 (8%)
Lower middle income	4 (2%)
Low income	2 (1%)
Type of intervention
Pharmacological	97 (49%)
Surgical/invasive procedure	42 (21%)
Non-invasive procedure	11 (6%)
Lifestyle intervention	15 (8%)
Screening/diagnostic intervention	9 (5%)
Psycho-therapeutic intervention	4 (2%)
Rehabilitation	6 (3%)
Other	16 (8%)
Type of control
Active control (as opposed to non-active)	82 (41%)
Number of trial sites; median (IQR)	2 (1–17)
Number of randomised participants; median (IQR)	160 (60–485)
Level of risk of bias associated with allocation concealment
High risk	4 (2%)
Low risk	59 (30%)
Unclear	137 (69%)
Reporting of conflicts of interest
Not reported	12 (6%)
Reported with no conflicts of interest disclosed	80 (40%)
Reported with conflicts of interest disclosed	108 (54%)
Inclusion of a funding statement
Included (as opposed to not included)	178 (89%)

*For continuous variables, numbers refer to median (IQR), indicated in the relevant row.

†The number of trial authors per trial ranged between 1 and 91.