Fig. 7

Difference in treatment ES estimate between: (a) trials with and without blinding of both patients and assessors (a positive value, more than zero, across meta-analyses indicates that lack of blinding of both patients and assessors inflates the treatment ES estimate when compared with trials with adequate blinding of patients and assessors); (b) trials with and without blinding of patients, assessors, and care providers (a positive value, more than zero, across meta-analyses indicates that lack of blinding of patients, assessors, and care providers inflates the treatment ES estimate when compared with trials adequately blinded in the three components). Diamond, difference in treatment ES estimate between trial components across all meta-analyses; square, proportional to weight used in meta-meta-analysis; horizontal arrow/line, a 95% confidence interval; solid vertical line, line of no difference in treatment ES estimate