| Methods |
Design: three group parallel trial
Purpose: examine the preventive effect of acupressure on nausea and vomiting after surgery |
| Participants |
Patients: women undergoing minor gynaecological surgery
Baseline comparability: yes |
| Interventions |
Placebo: acupressure bands not on P6 for 24 hours
Untreated: no acupressure
Experimental: acupressure on P6
(Co‐intervention: anaesthetic agents, rescue medication) |
| Outcomes |
Proportion of patients with complete response (no nausea, vomiting or rescue medication), time NS
Apfel risk score
Satisfaction with treatment |
| Notes |
|
| Risk of bias |
| Bias |
Authors' judgement |
Support for judgement |
| Adequate sequence generation? |
Unclear risk |
NS |
| Allocation concealment? |
Low risk |
'Sealed envelope' |
| Blinding?
Treatment provider |
High risk |
Described as double‐blind (Placebo/acupressure) but this referred to blinding of patient and outcome assessor. |
| Blinding?
Outcome assessor |
Unclear risk |
Not relevant as patients reported outcomes |
| Incomplete outcome data addressed?
All outcomes |
Low risk |
Drop‐out <15% |
| Free of selective reporting? |
Unclear risk |
No protocol available |
| Free of other bias? |
Low risk |
|
| No signs of variance inequality or skewness? |
Unclear risk |
Not relevant (binary outcome) |
| Trial size > 49? |
Low risk |
N = 275 |
| Clearly concealed allocation + trial size > 49 + drop‐out max 15% |
Low risk |
All three categories fulfilled |
