Table 1.

Characteristics of studies included

References	Country	Design	Patient number	Male (n)	Groups	ABT length (days)	Age (years, mean, SD)	Follow-up (days, median)	Outcomes measured
van Lent et al. [13]	Netherlands	Retrospective case–control	41	Not specified	G1: ABT for 3 days or less	Less than 3 days	Not specified, article states that groups are well matched	71	Mortality, recurrent cholangitis
			19		G2: ABT for 4–5 days	4–5 days		143
			20		G3: ABT for more than 5 days	More than 5 days		181
Kogure et al. [14]	Japan	Prospective single arm	18	12	Short ABT therapy group	3a	73 (12)	28	Mortality, recurrent cholangitis, duration of fever after ERCP
Limmathurotsakul et al. [15]	Thailand	Randomized controlled trial	8	5	G1: ABT stopped after temperature below 37.8 degrees for 72 h	5a (1.7b)	73.1 (15.9)	56	Mortality, recurrent cholangitis, duration of fever after ERCP
			8	5	G2: Full 14 days of ABT	14a (0.0b)	66.5 (15.3)	56
Uno et al. [16]	Japan	Retrospective cohort	51	35	G1: less than 2 weeks of ABT	10a	76 (11.1)	56	Mortality, recurrent cholangitis, length of hospitalization
			40	23	G2: more than 2 weeks of ABT	14.5a	81.7 (7.95)	56

^aMean

^bStandard deviation