Table 1.
Body of Evidence for Outcomes Assessed Using Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) Methods
| Outcome | Quality Assessment | Summary of Findings | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Patients, No. With Outcome/Total | Effect (95% CI) | Quality of Evidence | ||||||||||
| Studies, No. | Design | Risk of Bias | Inconsistency | Indirectness | Imprecision | Publication Bias | Intervention Group | Control Group | Relative Risk | Absolute RD, % | ||
| Need for antibiotic retreatment | 3 | RCT | Low | No serious limitations | Not present | Serious limitations: CI includes 0 | Not present | 53/641 | 50/647 | 1.07 (.74–1.55) | 0.5 (−2.4 to 3.5) | High |
| Need for hospitalization | 2 | RCT | Low | No serious limitations | Not present | Serious limitations: CI includes 0 | Not present | 0/231 | 0/247 | NA | 0.0 (−.8 to .8) | High |
| Treatment failure | 4 | RCT | Low | No serious limitations | Not present | Serious limitations: CI includes 0 | Not present | 61/768 | 62/773 | 0.99 (.71–1.39) | −0.1 (−2.8 to 2.6) | High |
| Any antibiotic-related adverse event | 2 | RCT | Some concerns (1 study did not report any adverse effects and 1 reported only severe effects) | No serious limitations | Not present | Serious limitations: CI includes 0 | Not present | 374/602 | 366/592 | 1.00 (.92–1.09) | 0.3 (−5.2 to 5.8) | Moderate |
| Severe antibiotic-related adverse event | 2 | RCT | Some concerns (1 study did not report any adverse effects and 1 did not report severity) | No serious limitations | Not present | Serious limitations: CI includes 0 | Not present | 1/329 | 2/332 | 0.50 (.05–5.52) | −0.3 (−1.3 to .7) | Moderate |
Abbreviations: CI, confidence interval; RCT, randomized controlled trial; RD, risk difference.