Article
Survey: Prioritization of clinical practice guideline topics
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Published: | July 10, 2012 |
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Outline
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Background: The first step of guideline development should always be identifying priority topics because resources required to produce and disseminate guidelines have to be expended carefully.
Objectives: The aim of our study was to perform a survey of DEGAM (German College of General Practitioners) members regarding prioritization criteria and future guideline topics. Involving the GPs in the process of guideline development should also create attention to guidelines and promote implementation.
Methods: Based on our literature research we designed a self-administered questionnaire. The realisation of the survey was effected via an online platform giving us the opportunity to organize and release the survey by an explicit web-address and to analyse the results.
Results: 2167 e-mails with an invitation to participate in the survey were sent and 386 questionnaires were returned (response rate 18%). Most of the participants agreed to consider the frequency of consultations (95%), the prevalence (86%), the individual (84%) and the general burden (82%) concerning a specific health problem within the prioritization process. One fifth quoted topics related to diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders with respect to future guideline themes.
Discussion: It is feasible to gather GPs´ opinions pertaining to the prioritization process and to potential guideline topics by performing an internet-based survey. However, lack of time prevented many GPs from responding to our survey.
Implication for guideline developers/users: Due to the specific situation of GPs in clinical practice, the development of priority and guideline topics should be based on the cooperation of a broader circle of stakeholders.