title: Evidence-based guidelines--an introduction.
abstract: Recommendations in the form of clinical practice guidelines are increasingly common. Clinical guidelines are systematically developed statements designed to help administrators, practitioners and patients make decisions about appropriate health care for specific circumstances. In North America, guidelines developed by professional societies, government panels and cooperative groups are frequently used to measure quality, to allocate resources and to determine how health care dollars are spent. For clinicians, guidelines provide a summary of the relevant medical literature and offer assistance in deciding which diagnostic tests to order, which treatments to use for specific conditions, when to discharge patients from the hospital, and many other aspects of clinical practice.
authors.affiliation: McMaster University, Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine, and St. Joseph's Hospital, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
authors.forename: Wendy
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Lim
authors.forename: Donald M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Arnold
authors.forename: Veronika
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Bachanova
authors.forename: Richard L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Haspel
authors.forename: Rachel P
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Rosovsky
authors.forename: Andrei R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Shustov
authors.forename: Mark A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Crowther
mesh_terms: D003657:Decision Making; D003695:Delivery of Health Care; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine / Q000592:standards*; D055317:Evidence-Based Practice / Q000592:standards*; D017408:Guidelines as Topic / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000592:standards; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000592:standards*; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care / Q000592:standards; D012107:Research Design / Q000592:standards; D040841:Resource Allocation / Q000592:standards*; D012196:Review Literature as Topic; D012955:Societies, Medical / Q000592:standards