Clinical practice guideline (CPG) activities must be planned carefully for efficient use of available resources and evidence-based implementation. De novo development of CPGs may sometimes 'recreate the wheel' and delay implementation. Three innovative alternatives to de novo CPG development (adopt, contextualise or adapt) are outlined, which have greater potential than de novo development to b...

Humanitarian professionals continue to seek best practice guidelines for famine relief. Many emergency interventions in developing countries draw on recent lessons from the 20 century, but attention has also been paid to historical experiences such as the 19 century evolution of India’s Famine Codes and responses to Ireland’s famine of the 1840s. This article goes further back in time to examin...

Formal methods for the development of clinical practice guidelines have emerged to address societal needs to decrease physician practice variation, slow the rise of health-care costs, monitor inappropriate care, assist clinicians to stay abreast of new clinical information, set research priorities, and promote better health-care outcomes. Evidence-based methods ensure that guidelines provide va...

A lthough clinical practice guidelines offer considerable promise for improving health-care outcomes, significant hurdles exist in implementing guideline recommendations. The conference attendees and invited experts participated in three discussion groups that developed recommendations for assisting the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP) in adopting strategies for guideline implementat...