1 Correction to: BioDrugs (2019) 33:373–389 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40259-019-00356-3

The authors unintentionally included in the meta-analysis both the initial abstract and the final paper of the study by Puertolas et al. [45, 48]. In order to remove this duplication, the following corrections are required.


Page 373, abstract, results, line 1: The following sentence, which previously read:


“We identified 29 studies that compared biosimilars of G-CSF or epoetin alfa: one RCT and five cohort studies (total N = 2816) of epoetin alfa biosimilars, and 13 RCTs and 10 cohort studies (total N = 23,561) of G-CSF biosimilars.”


should read:


“We identified 28 studies that compared biosimilars of G-CSF or epoetin alfa: one RCT and five cohort studies (total N = 2816) of epoetin alfa biosimilars, and 13 RCTs and 9 cohort studies (total N = 23,043) of G-CSF biosimilars.”


Page 377, fig. 1, the following text, which previously read:

Box 8: “Full-text excluded (n = 211)” should read “Full-text excluded (n = 212)”

“Duplicates: 91” should read “Duplicates 92”

Box 9: “Full-text articles assessed for eligibility (n = 29)” should read “Full-text articles assessed for eligibility (n = 28)”

Box 10: “Studies included in qualitative synthesis (n = 29)” should read “Studies included in qualitative synthesis (n = 28)”

Box 11: ‘Studies included in quantitative synthesis (n = 29)” should read ‘Studies included in quantitative synthesis (n = 28)”

“G-CSF biosimilars:13 RCTs + 10 Cohort studies” should read “G-CSF biosimilars:13 RCTs + 9 Cohort studies”

A corrected version of Fig. 1 is shown below:

Fig. 1
figure 1

PRISMA flowchart of included studies. G-CSF granulocyte colony-stimulating factors, RCT randomized controlled trial

Full size image

Page 379, Table 1, ‘G-CSF biosimilars vs. G-CSF’ section, ‘Puertolas et al. (2016) [45]’ row: the entire row should be deleted.


Page 379, Table 1, ‘G-CSF biosimilars vs. G-CSF’ section, ‘Puertolas et al. (2018) [48]’ row: The cell entry in column 4 ‘Sample size (B/R)’, which previously read “303/215” should read “49/49”.


Page 380, Table 1, ‘G-CSF biosimilars vs. G-CSF’ section, ‘Total patients of cohort studies’ row: the cell entry in column 4 ‘Sample size (B/R)’, which previously read “2677/17,739” should read “2374/17,524”.


Page 381, section 3.2.2, paragraph 1, line 1: The sentence, which previously read: “Ten cohort studies (2677 patients vs 17,739 patients)…” should read “Nine cohort studies (2374 patients vs 17,524 patients)…”.


Page 381, section 3.2.2, paragraph 3, line 10: The sentence, which previously read

“In addition, five cohort studies [40, 41, 45, 48, 49] compared the incidence of FN in cycle 1 in cancer patients treated with filgrastim biosimilars (860 patients) and filgrastim (6970 patients).”

should read

“In addition, four cohort studies [40, 41, 48, 49] compared the incidence of FN in cycle 1 in cancer patients treated with filgrastim biosimilars (557 patients) and filgrastim (6755 patients).”


Page 382, Table 3, ‘FN incidence in cycle 1 (3 wk)’ section, ‘Cohort study’ study type: the values in the ‘Cancer type/Breast cancer’ row and the ‘Total’ row have been corrected. A corrected version of the table is shown below with the corrected text shown in bold.

Table 3 Results for G-CSF biosimilars
Full size table

Page 384, Fig. 3, ‘FN incidence in cycle1.cohort study’ section, ‘Breast cancer’ subgroup:

  • the text in the ‘Study number’ column that previously read “3” should read “2”;

  • the text in the ‘Biosimilar sample size’ column that previously read “499” should read “196”;

  • the text in ‘Reference sample size’ column that previously read ‘398” should read “183”;

  • the text in the ‘P of meta-analysis’ column that previously read “0.22” should read “0.15”;

  • the text in the ‘P between sub-groups’ column that previously read “0.68” should read “0.43”;

  • the text in the ‘ES (95% CI)’ column that previously read “1.36 (0.84, 2.23)” should read “1.60 (0.85, 30.1)”.


Page 384, Fig. 3, ‘FN incidence in cycle1.cohort study’ section, ‘F biosimilars’ row:

  • the text in the ‘Study number’ column that previously read “5” should read “4”;

  • the text in the ‘Biosimilar sample size’ column that previously read “860” should read “557”;

  • the text in ‘Reference sample size’ column that previously read “6970” should read “6755”;

  • the text in the ‘P of meta-analysis’ column that previously read “0.36” should read “0.35”;

  • the text in the ‘ES (95% CI)’ column that previously read “1.20 (0.81, 1.78)” should read “1.25 (0.79, 1.98)”.

A corrected version of Fig. 3 is shown below.

Fig. 3
figure 3

Meta-analysis of G-CSF biosimilar drugs vs G-CSF drugs. ADE at least one adverse drug event, ANC absolute neutrophil count, CI confidence interval, DSN duration of severe (grade 4) neutropenia, ES effect size, F biosimilars filgrastim biosimilars, FN febrile neutropenia, G-CSF granulocyte colony-stimulating factors, NHL non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, NSCLC nonsquamous non–small-cell lung cancer, P biosimilars pegfilgrastim biosimilars, RCT randomized controlled trial, RR risk ratio, WMD weighted mean differences

Full size image

Page 388, Reference # 45: This reference should be deleted.


Electronic Supplementary Material, Supplementary Table 3, ‘Puertolas et al. 2016 [25]’ row: this row should be deleted.


Electronic Supplementary Material, Supplementary Table 5, ‘FN incidence in cycle1’ row:

the text in column ‘study’ that previously read “5 [20, 21, 25, 27, 28]” should read “4 [20, 21, 27, 28]”

the text in column ‘patient’ that previously read “7830” should read “7312”


Electronic Supplementary Material, page 9, reference #25: this reference should be deleted