Rating of The Guideline Quality
Rating of The Guideline Quality
xisting guidelines and clinical research should be critically appraised utilizing an established appraisal method (eg, Texas Children’s Hospital has implemented the use of Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation II [AGREE II] and28 GRADE methodologies for guidelines and clinical research, respectively29). With the review of evidence for each PICO question, unambiguous practice recommendations will be developed that give guidance to clinicians on the care of the patient. Remarks outlining the values and preferences of the patients, families, and providers can be incorporated into recommendations, especially when the desired effects of an intervention are closely balanced with the undesired effects.28 Where evidence is lacking, consensus amongst the guideline development team is needed with transparent statements to reflect the paucity of evidence.
Assessments of existing guidelines utilizing tools should be transparently demonstrated in the guideline. AGREE II is a 23-item instrument encompassing 6 domains: scope and purpose, stakeholder involvement, rigor of development, clarity of presentation, applicability, and editorial independence. Each item is ranked on a 7-point Likert scale and the item ratings are used to formulate an overall rating of the guideline quality.29 Ultimately, the guideline is either adopted, adopted with modifications (most common), or rejected. Other tools in addition to the AGREE II tool, such as the Institute of Medicine Standards for Developing Trustworthy Clinical Practice Guidelines, also exist.30,31
For each PICO question, studies should be critically evaluated as a body of evidence using an appraisal tool, such as GRADE.32 GRADE is a widely adopted global tool that allows for a seamless, transparent process of translating the evidence into clinically useful practice recommendations. Each practice recommendation is categorized as strong or weak and is supported by high, moderate, low, or very low-quality evidence.
Limitations in study design and execution, inconsistency between studies, indirectness between the PICO question and the studies, imprecision of the studies, and publication bias can lower the overall quality of evidence. Large estimates of treatment effect, evidence of a dose-response gradient, and plausible confounding that would increase confidence in an estimate of effect can raise the quality of evidence. The strength of the recommendation is “the extent to which we can be confident that adherence to the recommendation will do more than harm.”
You must proofread your paper. But do not strictly rely on your computer’s spell-checker and grammar-checker; failure to do so indicates a lack of effort on your part and you can expect your grade to suffer accordingly. Papers with numerous misspelled words and grammatical mistakes will be penalized. Read over your paper – in silence and then aloud – before handing it in and make corrections as necessary. Often it is advantageous to have a friend proofread your paper for obvious errors. Handwritten corrections are preferable to uncorrected mistakes.
Use a standard 10 to 12 point (10 to 12 characters per inch) typeface. Smaller or compressed type and papers with small margins or single-spacing are hard to read. It is better to let your essay run over the recommended number of pages than to try to compress it into fewer pages.
Likewise, large type, large margins, large indentations, triple-spacing, increased leading (space between lines), increased kerning (space between letters), and any other such attempts at “padding” to increase the length of a paper are unacceptable, wasteful of trees, and will not fool your professor.
The paper must be neatly formatted, double-spaced with a one-inch margin on the top, bottom, and sides of each page. When submitting hard copy, be sure to use white paper and print out using dark ink. If it is hard to read your essay, it will also be hard to follow your argument.
