Statistical analysis
All statistical analyses were conducted using R-3.6.0 program (R
Development Core Team: R: A language and environment for statistical
computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria).
Between-group comparisons were performed using the Mann–Whitney U test
or Wilcoxon rank sum test for continuous variables and using the
Fisher’s
exact test for categorical variables. P values of <0.05
were considered statistically significant.