3.3 Results of network meta-analysis
The network plots of each outcome are presented in Figure 3 (A, B and C), presenting the results and quality of evidence for IOP at the 4th week, the 12th week , and the 24th week of triamcinolone acetonide treatment by different routes of administration. Heterogeneity of the network meta-analysis is also shown in the appendix(Supplementary Figure 1-3).
3.4 IOP
Eighteen RCTs including 834 eyes (575 patients) reported IOP after triamcinolone therapy with different routes of administration. Intervention nodes included in this network meta-analysis were intravitreal injection triamcinolone, retrobulbar injections triamcinolone, sub-Tenon’s infusion of triamcinolone, suprachoroidal triamcinolone, and placebo. The GRADE quality for network meta-analysis is shown in Figure 4. Detailed data are shown in the appendix (Supplementary Table 4-6). In pairwise comparisons within the network of these RCTs: at the 4th week, there was no statistically significant effect on IOP between triamcinolone acetonide by different routes of administration and placebo. At the 12th week, there was a significant difference in IOP between IVTA and STiTA (MD, 1.67 [95% CrI, 0.25, 3.15], Figure 4B), whereas other pairwise comparisons were not different from each other. At the 24th week, compared with the placebo group, IVTA, SCTA and STiTA had statistically significant effects on IOP (MD, 1.35 [95% CrI, 0.23, 2.30], 2.42 [95% CrI, 4.53, 0.19], and 1.31 [95% CrI, 2.49, 0.02], Figure 4C).
3.5Rankings and sucra
The rank probabilities of different routes of administration for triamcinolone acetonide and placebo are shown in Figure 5. The rank diagrams show that the probabilities of RITA being the safest routes of administration were 35.50% (the 4th week), 57.80% (the 12th week), and 65.60% (the 24th week). The rank diagrams show that the probabilities of IVTA being among the top safety routes of administration are both 0.00% at the 4th week, the 12th week, and the 24th week. The SUCRA values of triamcinolone acetonide treatment by different routes of administration were RITA (0.7041) > STiTA (0.5865) > PLA (0.5431) > SCTA (0.5149) > IVTA (0.1513) at the 4th week, RITA (0.8029) > STiTA (0.6380) > PLA (0.5973) > SCTA (0.3691) > IVTA (0.0926) at the 12th week, and RITA (0.8726) > PLA (0.8221)> STiTA (0.3704) > IVTA (0.3565) > SCTA (0.0783) at the 24th week. Detailed data are shown in Supplementary Tables 7-9.