Table 1.

The applied criteria for a population, intervention/exposure, comparator, outcome, and study design (PICOS).

PICOS	Inclusion Criteria	Exclusion Criteria
Population	Menstruating human subjects with anemia/low iron stores	Patients with any diseases and conditions, which may influence iron status or influence the reliability of results; pregnancy
Intervention/exposure	Dietary intervention applied to correct anemia/low iron stores	Dietary intervention not described within the study
Comparison	Effectiveness of dietary intervention compared with the effectiveness of supplementation, placebo, control, or the other dietary approach	Effectiveness of dietary intervention influenced by interfering variables applied within the study
Outcome	Biochemical measure of anemia/iron stores	Biochemical measure of anemia/iron stores presented for a mixed population only
Study design	Randomized controlled trials	Studies not published in peer-reviewed journals; studies not published in English; retracted articles