Baseline comparisons of patient characteristics Baseline characteristics are presented for each intervention group. Frequencies, proportions and percentages will be used to summarize discrete variables. In case of missing values, percentages are presented with the actual denominator and otherwise calculated according to the number of participating patients. Continuous variables are summarized using standard measures of central tendency and dispersion using either mean ± SD for data with normal distribution or median and interquartile range for non-normally distributed data.