del Castillo 2005.

Methods	Study design: parallel RCT Time frame: 2002 to 2004 Follow‐up period: 1 year Primary endpoint: not reported
Participants	Country: Spain, Portugal Setting: multicentre (16 centres) First kidney transplant, no further inclusion criteria provided Number (randomised/analysed): withdrawal group (70/70); maintenance group (72/72) Mean age ± SD (years): withdrawal group (47 ± 11); maintenance group (47 ± 11) Sex (female): withdrawal group (53%); maintenance group (26%) Exclusion criteria: not reported
Interventions	Treatment group Steroid withdrawal 6 months after transplantation Control group Steroid maintenance Baseline immunosuppression CsA: not reported MMF: not reported Prednisone: not reported
Outcomes	Mortality Graft loss Acute rejection Biopsy‐proven acute rejection SCr (mg/dL) CrCl (mL/min)
Notes	Did not report number screened for eligibility 4 patients were excluded post randomisation but pre‐intervention because they did not fulfil the inclusion criteria 2 control patients lost to follow‐up during the 12 months
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Unclear risk	Stated 'randomised' but no further information provided
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	Unclear risk	Not reported
Blinding (performance bias and detection bias) All outcomes	High risk	Open‐label
Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) All outcomes	High risk	Open‐label
Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) All outcomes	Low risk	Outcomes are objective hard endpoints
Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes	Low risk	ITT analysis performed; all patients followed‐up or accounted for
Selective reporting (reporting bias)	Low risk	Primary outcomes for this review reported
Other bias	Unclear risk	Funding source not reported; abstract data only