Table 3 Quality assessment of studies on lactose-free versus lactose-containing liquid feeds
From: Dietary management of childhood diarrhea in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review
| Â | Â | QUALITY ASSESSMENT | SUMMARY OF FINDINGS | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Number of studies | Diarrhea mode | Design | Limitations | Consistency | Generalizability to population of interest | Overall quality of evidence | Number of events in intervention group | Number of events in control group | Effect size (95% CI) |
OUTCOME: DURATION OF DIARRHEA | Standardized Mean Difference | ||||||||
5 | Acute | RCT | Study quality ranges from moderate to high | Heterogeneous (I2= 60%) | Infants and young children (≤24m) with acute diarrhea, without severe malnutrition, in LMICs | Moderate | - | - | -0.36 [-0.62, -0.10] |
0 | Persistent | RCT | No studies | - | - | - | - | - | - |
OUTCOME: STOOL OUTPUT | Standardized Mean Difference | ||||||||
3 | Acute | RCT | Study quality ranges from moderate to high | Heterogeneous (I2= 76%) | Infants and young children (≤24m) with acute diarrhea, without severe malnutrition, in LMICs | Moderate | - | - | -0.26 [-0.80, 0.28] |
0 | Persistent | RCT | No studies | - | - | - | - | - | - |
OUTCOME: WEIGHT GAIN | Standardized Mean Difference | ||||||||
3 | Acute | RCT | Study quality ranges from moderate to high | Heterogeneous (I2= 41%) | Infants and young children (≤24m) with acute diarrhea, not severely malnourished, in LMICs | Moderate | - | - | 0.05 [-0.22, 0.33] |
1 | Persistent | RCT | Single study of low quality | - | Infants and young children (≤22m) with persistent diarrhea, not dehydrated or severely malnourished, in LMICs | Very low | - | - | 0.90 (0.07, 1.73) |
OUTCOME: TREATMENT FAILURE | Risk Ratio | ||||||||
7 | Acute | RCT | Study quality ranges from low to high | Consistent (I2= 0%) | Infants and young children (≤24m) with acute diarrhea, not severely malnourished, in LMICs | Moderate | 50 | 57 | 0.53 [0.40, 0.70] |
2 | Persistent | RCT | Only two studies, of low and high quality | Consistent (I2= 0%) | Infants and young children (≤36m) with persistent diarrhea, not severely malnourished, in LMICs | Low | 4 | 11 | 0.17 [0.06, 0.48] |