| Methods |
Design: three group parallel trial
Purpose: examine the effect of acupuncture on depression |
| Participants |
Patients: out‐patients with depression (score of 14 or more on the 17‐item Hamilton rating scale for depression)
Baseline comparability: yes |
| Interventions |
Placebo: needling in acupuncture points not regarded having impact on depression
Untreated: no needling
Experimental: needling in acupuncture points regarded having impact on depression
(Co‐intervention: NS) |
| Outcomes |
Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (17 item)
Beck Depression Inventory |
| Notes |
|
| Risk of bias |
| Bias |
Authors' judgement |
Support for judgement |
| Adequate sequence generation? |
Unclear risk |
NS |
| Allocation concealment? |
Unclear risk |
NS |
| Blinding?
Treatment provider |
Low risk |
'The treating acupuncturists were blind to the experimental hypotheses...' (Placebo/acupuncture) |
| Blinding?
Outcome assessor |
Low risk |
'Patients were blind to intervention condition, as were raters who assessed outcome' |
| 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? |
High risk |
Either variance inequality (F‐test statistically significant) or skewness (1.64 standard deviations exceeds the mean) |
| Trial size > 49? |
Low risk |
N = 89 |
| Clearly concealed allocation + trial size > 49 + drop‐out max 15% |
High risk |
Allocation not clearly concealed |
