title: Standard operating procedures for ESPEN guidelines and consensus papers.
abstract: The ESPEN Guideline standard operating procedures (SOP) is based on the methodology provided by the Association of Scientific Medical Societies of Germany (AWMF), the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN), and the Centre for Evidence-based Medicine at the University of Oxford. The SOP is valid and obligatory for all future ESPEN-sponsored guideline projects aiming to generate high-quality guidelines on a regular basis. The SOP aims to facilitate the preparation of guideline projects, to streamline the consensus process, to ensure quality and transparency, and to facilitate the dissemination and publication of ESPEN guidelines. To achieve this goal, the ESPEN Guidelines Editorial board (GEB) has been established headed by two chairmen. The GEB will support and supervise the guideline processes and is responsible for the strategic planning of ESPEN guideline activities. Key elements of the SOP are the generation of well-built clinical questions according to the PICO system, a systemic literature search, a classification of the selected literature according to the SIGN evidence levels providing an evidence table, and a clear and straight-forward consensus procedure consisting of online voting's and a consensus conference. Only experts who meet the obligation to disclosure any potential conflict of interests and who are not employed by the Industry can participate in the guideline process. All recommendations will be graded according to the SIGN grading and novel outcome models besides biomedical endpoints. This approach will further extent the leadership of ESPEN in creating up-to-date and suitable for implementation guidelines and in sharing knowledge on malnutrition and clinical nutrition.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nutritional Medicine, University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, Germany. Electronic address: bischoff.stephan@uni-hohenheim.de.
authors.forename: Stephan C
authors.initials: SC
authors.lastname: Bischoff
authors.affiliation: Department of General Intensive Care and Institute for Nutrition Research, Rabin Medical Center, Beilinson Hospital, Tel Aviv University, Petah Tikva, Israel. Electronic address: psinger@clalit.org.il.
authors.forename: Pierre
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Singer
authors.affiliation: Center for Clinical Studies, University Hospital Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany. Electronic address: michael.koller@klinik.uni-regensburg.de.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Koller
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical, Surgical and Health Sciences, University of Trieste, Italy. Electronic address: barazzon@units.it.
authors.forename: Rocco
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Barazzoni
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical Nutrition and Metabolism, Uppsala University, Uppsala University Hospital, Uppsala, Sweden; Department of Geriatric Medicine, Uppsala University Hospital, Uppsala, Sweden. Electronic address: tommy.cederholm@pubcare.uu.se.
authors.forename: Tommy
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Cederholm
authors.affiliation: Department of Gastroenterology, Erasme Hospital, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium. Electronic address: andre.vangossum@erasme.ulb.ac.be.
authors.forename: André
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: van Gossum
mesh_terms: D032921:Consensus; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic / Q000592:standards*; D012958:Societies, Scientific
keywords: Clinical nutrition; Evidence level; Guideline; Position paper; Recommendation grading; Standard operating procedure