Biliary stenting with or without sphincterotomy for malignant biliary obstruction: A meta-analysis

Table 1 Baseline characteristics of the included trials in the meta-analysis

Ref.	Definition of	Group	Age (yr)	Diagnosis (n)			Gender	Endoscopist	Type of	Sedation	Prophy
	complications			Pancreatic	Cholangio-	Others	(M/F)		stent		lactic
				cancer	carcinoma						antibiotics
Giorgioet al[10]	According to the criteria of Cotton et al[32]	EST	72 ± 6	64	31	1	51/35	Two experienced endoscopists	Plastic stent	Not mentioned	Not mentioned
		Non-EST	75 ± 6	67	28	1	47/39
Artifon et al[11]	According to the criteria of Cotton et al[32]	EST	72.1	30	0	7	18/19	Three experienced endoscopists	Covered SEMS	Midazolam and fentanyl	Before ERCP
		Non-EST	65.4	30	0	7	12/25
Zhou et al[12]	According to the criteria of Cotton et al[32]	EST	65.1 ± 9.5	11	26	4	24/17	Two experienced endoscopists	Uncovered SEMS	Not mentioned	During ERCP
		Non-EST	64.0 ± 7.5	10	27	4	23/18

SEMS: Self-expandable metal stent; EST: Endoscopic sphincterotomy; ERCP: Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography.