Table 3.

GRADE table

	Risk of bias	Inconsistency	Indirectness	Imprecision	GRADE score
Cryotherapy	Negligible	Negligible	Serious*	Negligible	Moderate
Exercise	Serious†	Negligible	Negligible	Negligible	Moderate
NMES	Serious‡	Serious§	Negligible	Negligible	Low
TENS	Negligible	Serious§	Serious¶	Negligible	Low
Vibration	Negligible	Negligible	Serious**	Very serious††	Very low
Ultrasound	Negligible	Negligible‡‡	Serious§§	Very serious¶¶	Very low

GRADE calculation.

Risk of bias: PEDro <6, decrease one grade; PEDro <4, decrease two grades.

Inconsistency: Heterogeneity of results (wide variance of effect sizes), decrease one grade.

Indirectness: Population of study is not ACLR, decrease one grade.

Imprecision: Lower threshold of 95% CI reduces effect to negligible, decrease one grade; lower threshold of 95% CI would alter conclusion or not provided, decrease two grades.

*Indirectness of evidence (only one trial in ACLR patients with AMI).

†PEDro score of 5 for three of the four trials.

‡PEDro score of 5 for two of the three trials.

§Heterogeneity of results.

¶Indirectness of evidence (effect only seen in laboratory trials).

**Indirectness of evidence (one of the two trials was a laboratory test).

††Imprecision (CIs or SDs not provided in Blackburn et al ²³ study).

‡‡Note: only one study.

§§Indirectness of evidence (knee injury population, not specifically ACL).

¶¶Imprecision (wide CIs, lower limit of effect size is negative).

ACLR, ACL reconstruction; AMI, arthrogenic muscle inhibition; NMES, neuromuscular electrical stimulation; PEDro, Physiotherapy Evidence Database; TENS, transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation.