There were 13 articles included in the systematic review, describing seven different studies comprising the period of 1998 to 2007, three of them implemented in England and the others located in Scotland, Australia, China and Canada respectively. The studies are all randomised controlled trials, two of them having a cluster design. The nurse-led clinics in the included RCTs were mostly implemented in a general practice setting; one was hospital based with follow-up at home. Follow-up duration ranged from three months to ten years; the majority concluded at one year. Methodological quality of the studies was very good, apart from the randomisation, which was only exactly described and truly randomised in one Chinese study.