. 2018 Jan 18;26(2):110–119. doi: 10.1177/2292550317747854

Table 4.

The Methodological Quality of the Included Non-Randomized Studies.

MINORS Criteria	Gutowski et al²⁶	Adams et al⁷	Pfeiffer et al²²	Giordano et al²⁵	Drinane et al²⁷	Blount et al²³
1. A clearly stated aim	Unclear	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	High risk
2. Inclusion of consecutive patients	Low risk	Unclear	Unclear	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk
3. Prospective collection of data	High risk	Low risk	High risk	High risk	Low risk	High risk
4. End points appropriate to the aim of the study	Unclear	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Unclear
5. Unbiased assessment of the study end point	Unclear	Unclear	High risk	Unclear	High risk	Unclear
6. Follow-up period appropriate to the aim of the study	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk	Low risk
7. Loss to follow-up less than 5%	Unclear	Unclear	Unclear	Unclear	Low risk	Unclear
8. Prospective calculation of the study size	High risk	High risk	High risk	High risk	High risk	High risk
9. An adequate control group^a	NA	NA	High risk	Low risk	Low risk	Unclear
10. Contemporary groups^a (historical comparison)	NA	NA	High risk	High risk	Low risk	Low risk
11. Baseline equivalence of groups^a	NA	NA	High risk	Unclear	Unclear	Unclear
12. Adequate statistical analyses^a	NA	NA	High risk	High risk	High risk	Low risk
MINOR score	6/16 (38%)	9/16 (56%)	13/24 (42%)	14/24 (58%)	20/24 (83%)	11/24 (46%)

Abbreviations. MINOR, Methodological index for non-randomized studies; NA, not applicable.