Antibiotic therapy for pelvic inflammatory disease: a network meta-analysis.

This is a protocol for a Cochrane review (intervention). The objectives are as follows: To assess the comparative benefits and harms of systemic antibiotic regimens for the treatment of acute pelvic inflammatory disease in women of reproductive age. The secondary objectives are: to estimate the incremental effect of adding nitroimidazole to an antibiotic backbone; to compare the efficacy of azithromycin-containing regimens with relevant alternatives, where the evidence network permits (in Network B, this comparison depends on setting-disaggregated data from a single eligible trial and may not be estimable); and to describe narratively whether treatment hierarchies appear consistent between the outpatient (Network A) and inpatient (Network B) evidence, since direct statistical comparison between networks is not undertaken.