Antibiotics alone versus appendectomy to treat uncomplicated acute appendicitis in adults: what do meta-analyses say?

Table 1 Characteristics of included meta-analyses comparing antibiotics alone versus appendectomy in patients with acute uncomplicated appendicitis

Author (year)	Patients included			Study included	Study design	Quality evaluation
	Total	A	S
Varadhan et al. (2010) [13]	661	350	311	3 [24–26]	RCT	2.7^a
Liu et al. (2011) [14]	1201	433	768	6 [24–29]	RCT	≥5^b
Liu et al. (2011) [14]	1201	433	768	6 [24–29]	Observational	≥5^b
Ansaloni et al. (2011) [15]	741	390	351	4 [24–26, 28]	RCT	Poor
Wilms et al. (2011) [16]	901	415	486	5 [25, 26, 28–30]	RCT	Low-moderate
Mason et al. (2012) [17]	980	510	470	5 [24–26, 28, 30]	RCT	1.8^a
Varadhan et al. (2012) [18]	900	470	430	4 [24–26, 30]	RCT	Moderate^c
Liu et al. (2014) [19]	983	391	592	5 [24–26, 29, 31]	RCT	3.2^a
Kirby et al. (2015) [11]	531	268	263	3 [25, 26, 30]	RCT	N/A

^aMean Jadad score
^bNOQAS
^cGRADE system
Abbreviations: A antibiotics therapy group, S surgery group, RCT randomized controlled trial, NOQAS Newcastle-Ottawa Quality Assessment Scale, GRADE Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation, N/A data not available

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