Guidelines
Systematically developed statements to assist practitioners and patients in arriving at decisions on appropriate health care for specific clinical circumstances
The purpose of guidelines is to make explicit recommendations with a definite intent to influence what clinicians do. While there are a vast number of guidelines available, credible and useful guidelines employ the Evidence-based process to assemble, organize and synthesize the best available evidence from clinical research. This evidence is then integrated with clinical experience to develop the recommendations enhancing clinical judgement not replacing it.
Evidence-based guidelines are based on systematic reviews of the literature. Systematic reviews use rigorous and explicit methods to search for and critically appraise the entire body of clinical research evidence related to a question. By evaluating the scientific evidence in a rigorous and structured manner, it may be possible to begin to determine which interventions are beneficial and which are ineffective or even harmful, and to elucidate where the research evidence is weak, contradictory or lacking.
Resources
Guidance
- AGREE Enterprise Website
- GRADE-Grading of Recommendations Assessment,Development and Evaluation Working Group
- NICE (National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) Methodology
- SIGN (Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network) Methodology
Other
- American Dental Association – Clinical Practice Guidelines
- Guidelines International Network
- National Guideline Clearing House (USA)
- National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)
- New Zealand Guidelines Group
- Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN)
- Scottish Dental Clinical Effectiveness Programme (SDCEP)
Articles
- Systems for grading the quality of evidence and the strength of recommendations I: Critical appraisal of existing approachs The GRADE Working Group . BMC Health Services Research 2004
- Systems for grading the quality of evidence and the strength of recommendations II: Pilot study of a new system BMC HEalth Services Research 2005
- Grading quality of evidence and strength of recommendations BMJ 2004;328:1490