Publication bias and sensitivity analysis
Egger’s test (t =1.35, p =0.226) indicated no significant publication bias was found across the included studies for CD. Meanwhile, Egger’s test (t =1.92, p =0.097) also did not find significant publication bias in studies for UC.
Figure 4 shows the outcomes of the sensitivity analysis. The results were not significantly changed after checking the overall effect by the leave one out method, suggesting that the meta-analysis results were stable.