Chen 2002.

Methods	Study design: parallel, 2‐arm RCT Time frame: not reported Duration of follow‐up: 18 months
Participants	Setting: single centre Country: China Inclusion criteria: severe IgAN, Lee SMK grade IV‐V, with urinary protein >2.0 g/d, SCr < 355.2 µmol/L Number (analysed/randomised): treatment group (not reported/31); control group (not reported/31) Mean age ± SD (years): not reported Sex (M/F): not reported Exclusion criteria: not reported
Interventions	Treatment group MMF 1.0 g/d (body weight <50 kg) or 1.5 g/d (body weight >50 kg), reduced to 0.75 to 1.00 g/d after 6 months, and maintained at 0.5 to 0.75 g/d after 12 months of treatment Control group Prednisone: 0.8 mg/kg/day Co‐interventions Not reported
Outcomes	Proteinuria Plasma albumin, serum cholesterol and triglycerides Adverse events
Notes	Conference abstract Trials registration identification number: not reported Funding source: not reported
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Unclear risk	Insufficient information to permit judgement
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	Unclear risk	Insufficient information to permit judgement
Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) All outcomes	High risk	Open‐label study
Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) All outcomes	High risk	Blinding of outcome assessment not specifically reported. Key outcomes were objective laboratory measures and were unlikely to be affected by any knowledge of treatment allocation. Reporting of adverse events may have been influenced by knowledge of treatment allocation
Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes	Unclear risk	Insufficient information to permit judgement
Selective reporting (reporting bias)	High risk	There was no pre‐specified protocol identified for this study. The study did not report extractable data for the key outcomes that would be expected for a study of this type (e.g., death (any cause), GFR loss, infection, malignancy)
Other bias	Unclear risk	Insufficient information to permit judgement. Methods of randomisation, baseline characteristics were not reported to assess quality of randomisation