ADIPOQ and systemic sclerosis: After removing the duplicates and irrelevant studies following the set inclusion and exclusion criteria, seven studies were finally selected for the meta-analysis.16,18,19,42, , –45Figure 2 illustrates the study identification, screening, and selection process in detail completed following the PRISMA 2020 guidelines.23 The selected studies included, in total, data from 439 SSc cases (dcSSc = 181, lcSSc = 258) and 274 healthy controls compared for serum or plasma adiponectin levels in European individuals from different regions.