The ‘Characteristics of included studies’ table has five entries for each study: Methods, Participants, Interventions, Outcomes and Notes. Up to three further entries may be specified for items not conveniently covered by these categories, for example, to provide information on length of follow-up, funding source, or indications of study quality that are unlikely to lead directly to a risk of bias (see Section 4.6.2 for including information on the risk of bias). Codes or abbreviations may be used in the table to enable clear and succinct presentation of multiple pieces of information within an entry; for example, authors could include country, setting, age and sex under the Participants entry. Footnotes should be used to explain any codes or abbreviations used (these will be published in the CDSR).
See also
Detailed guidance on ‘Characteristics of included studies’ tables is provided in Chapter 11 (Section 11.2.2).