CASP criteria appraisal for RCTs

1. Chiu et al., 2018

2. Denis et al., 2020

3. Freeman et al., 2015

4. Freeman et al., 2017

5. Sheaves et al., 2018a

Section A: Are the results of the trial valid?

Q1. Did the trial address a clearly focused issue?

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Q2. Was the assignment of patients to treatments randomised?

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Q3. Were all of the patients who entered the trial properly accounted for at its conclusion?

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Section B: Is it worth continuing?

Q4. Were patients, health workers and study personnel blind to treatment?

No

No

No

No

No

Q5. Were the groups similar at the start of the trial?

No

No

No

No

No

Q6. Aside from the experimental intervention, were the groups treated equally?

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

Section C: What are the results?

Q7. How large was the treatment?

Medium to Large effect

Small to

medium

Large effect

Large effect

Large effect

Q8. How precise was the estimate of the treatment effect?

d = 0.66

d = 0.42

d = 1.9

d = 1.1

d = 0.9

Section C: Will the results help locally?

Q9. Can the results be applied to local population or in your context?

Can’t tell

yes

yes

yes

yes

Section D: Will the results help locally?

Q10. Were all clinically important outcomes considered?

yes

No

yes

yes

No

Q11. Are the benefits worth the harms and costs?

yes

yes

yes

yes

yes

Appraisal Summary: Score out of 9

6

6

7

7

6

Study Quality

Moderate

Quality

Moderate Quality

High Quality

High Quality

Moderate

Quality