Literature search and selection criteria
Embase and Pubmed (from inception to May 2020) were systematically searched, using the appropriate terminology as described inTable S1 . Besides, the reference lists of the articles reviewed as full texts were also searched manually. The inclusion criteria in the meta-analysis were as follows: patients treated with CCRT for LACC; FDG PET/CT scans performed before or during treatment; and relationship between the parameters of FDG PET/CT and the prognosis of patients was detected. Studies meeting the following criteria were excluded: publication type other than original research articles (i.e., review articles, conference abstracts, and editorial), patients treated with surgery at any point in treatment, patients treated with chemotherapy or radiotherapy alone, and patients lacking important information for analysis (i.e., articles reporting hazard ratios [HRs], using Cox proportional hazards modeling with parameters as a continuous variable). Two authors conducted the searches and screening independently. Any discrepancies were resolved by consensus with another reviewer.