Table 1.

Characteristics of the included studies.

#	Author and year	Country	Study design	Study arms
				fTRAM	pTRAM	DIEP	SIEA
1	Selber et al. 2008 [26]	USA	Retrospective cohort study	569	NA	NA	69
2	Momoh et al. 2012 [4]	USA	Retrospective cohort study	NA	197	217	NA
3	Nahabedian et al. 2005 [23]	USA	Retrospective cohort study	113	NA	110	NA
4	Nahabedian et al. 2002 [27]	USA	Retrospective cohort study	143	NA	20	NA
5	Chevray. 2004 [24]	USA	Prospective cohort study	25	NA	8	14
6	Bajaj et al. 2006 [12]	USA	Retrospective cohort	155	NA	48	NA
7	Chun et al. 2010 [29]	USA	Retrospective cohort	105	NA	85	NA
8	Schaverien et al. 2007 [30]	UK	Retrospective cohort	30	NA	30	NA
9	Erdmann-Sager et al. 2018 [21]	USA	Prospective cohort	115	89	445	71
10	Scheer et al. 2006 [31]	Canada	Retrospective cohort	46	NA	84	NA
11	Chang et al. 2016 [32]	USA	Retrospective cohort	340	NA	573	NA
12	Nahabedian et al. 2002 [9]	USA	Retrospective cohort	108	37	10	NA
13	Langer et al. 2010 [33]	USA	Retrospective cohort	254	NA	451	1
14	Garvey et al. 2006 [34]	USA and Canada	Retrospective cohort	NA	94	96	NA
15	Agarwal. Gottlieb. 2007 [35]	USA	Retrospective cohort	8	NA	6	NA
16	Kroll. 2000 [36]	USA	Retrospective cohort	279	NA	31	NA
17	Holoyda et al. 2019 [37]	USA	Retrospective cross-sectional study	3007	2180	8007	154
18	Chen et al. 2007 [22]	USA	Prospective cohort	159	NA	41	NA
19	Kwok et al. 2019 [38]	USA	Retrospective cross-sectional study	4461	5079	6206	245
20	Andree et al. 2008 [39]	Germany	Retrospective cohort	148	NA	201	NA
21	Vega et al. 2006 [40]	USA	Retrospective cohort	11	NA	2	10
22	Wan et al. 2010 [41]	USA	Retrospective cohort	57	NA	200	NA
23	Andrades et al. 2008 [42]	USA	Retrospective cohort	154	147	NA	NA
24	Seidenstuecker et al. 2011 [23]	Germany	Prospective cohort	224	NA	400	NA
25	Takeishi et al. 2008 [43]	Japan	Retrospective study	79	NA	30	NA
26	Baumann et al. 2010 [25]	USA	Prospective study	120	NA	71	37
27	Masoomi et al. 2014 [44]	USA	Retrospective cohort	6556	NA	8153	304
28	Wu et al. 2014 [45]	USA	Retrospective cross-sectional study	NA	69	69	NA
29	Futter et al. 2000 [46]	Scotland	Retrospective study	27	NA	23	NA
30	Vyas et al. 2008 [47]	USA	Retrospective review	37	NA	128	NA
31	Coroneos et al. 2015 [48]	Canada	Retrospective cohort study	NA	NA	75	37
32	Shubinets et al. 2016 [49]	USA	Retrospective cohort study	2474	2406	3366	NA
33	Bonde et al. 2006 [50]	Denmark	Retrospective cohort study	4	NA	25	NA
34	Zhong et al. 2014 [51]	Canada	Retrospective study	244	NA	48	NA