Example of treatment hierarchies from different ranking metrics for a network of nine antihypertensive treatment for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease
| Treatment | Original data | Fictional data with increased precision for conventional treatment versus ARB | ||||
 Ranks |  Ranks | Relative treatment effect ranks |  Ranks |  Ranks | Relative treatment effect ranks | |
| Conventional | 1 | 6 | 3.5 | 3 | 4 | 3.5 |
| Diuretic/beta-blocker | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| ARB | 3 | 3 | 3.5 | 4.5 | 3 | 3.5 |
| CCB | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| Alpha-blocker | 5 | 7 | 7 | 4.5 | 7 | 7 |
| ACE-inhibitor | 6 | 4 | 5 | 6.5 | 5 | 5 |
| Diuretic | 7 | 5 | 6 | 6.5 | 6 | 6 |
| Placebo | 8.5 | 9 | 9 | 8.5 | 9 | 9 |
| Beta-blocker | 8.5 | 8 | 8 | 8.5 | 8 | 8 |
Relative treatment effect stands for the relative treatment effect against fictional treatment of average performance. The first three rankings from the left-hand side are obtained using the original data; the equivalent three rankings on the right-hand side are produced by reducing the standard error of the conventional versus ARB treatment effect from 0.7 to a fictional value of 0.01.
ACE, angiotensin converting enzyme; ARB, angiotensin receptor blockers; CCB, calcium channel blockers; pBV, probability of producing the best value; SUCRAF, surface under the cumulative ranking curve (calculated in frequentist setting).