Background
There is a need for the development of comprehensive, global, evidence‐based guidance for stakeholder engagement in guideline development. Stakeholders are any individual or group who is ...responsible for or affected by health‐ and healthcare‐related decisions. This includes patients, the public, providers of health care and policymakers for example. As part of the guidance development process, Multi‐Stakeholder Engagement (MuSE) Consortium set out to conduct four concurrent systematic reviews to summarise the evidence on: (1) existing guidance for stakeholder engagement in guideline development, (2) barriers and facilitators to stakeholder engagement in guideline development, (3) managing conflicts of interest in stakeholder engagement in guideline development and (4) measuring the impact of stakeholder engagement in guideline development. This protocol addresses the second systematic review in the series.
Objectives
The objective of this review is to identify and synthesise the existing evidence on barriers and facilitators to stakeholder engagement in health guideline development. We will address this objective through two research questions: (1) What are the barriers to multi‐stakeholder engagement in health guideline development across any of the 18 steps of the GIN‐McMaster checklist? (2) What are the facilitators to multi‐stakeholder engagement in health guideline development across any of the 18 steps of the GIN‐McMaster checklist?
Search Methods
A comprehensive search strategy will be developed and peer‐reviewed in consultation with a medical librarian. We will search the following databases: MEDLINE, Cumulative Index to Nursing & Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), EMBASE, PsycInfo, Scopus, and Sociological s. To identify grey literature, we will search the websites of agencies who actively engage stakeholder groups such as the AHRQ, Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Strategy for Patient‐Oriented Research (SPOR), INVOLVE, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and the PCORI. We will also search the websites of guideline‐producing agencies, such as the American Academy of Pediatrics, Australia's National Health Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the WHO. We will invite members of the team to suggest grey literature sources and we plan to broaden the search by soliciting suggestions via social media, such as Twitter.
Selection Criteria
We will include empirical qualitative and mixed‐method primary research studies which qualitatively report on the barriers or facilitators to stakeholder engagement in health guideline development. The population of interest is stakeholders in health guideline development. Building on previous work, we have identified 13 types of stakeholders whose input can enhance the relevance and uptake of guidelines: Patients, caregivers and patient advocates; Public; Providers of health care; Payers of health services; Payers of research; Policy makers; Program managers; Product makers; Purchasers; Principal investigators and their research teams; and Peer‐review editors/publishers. Eligible studies must describe stakeholder engagement at any of the following steps of the GIN‐McMaster Checklist for Guideline Development.
Data Collection and Analysis
All identified citations from electronic databases will be imported into Covidence software for screening and selection. Documents identified through our grey literature search will be managed and screened using an Excel spreadsheet. A two‐part study selection process will be used for all identified citations: (1) a title and review and (2) full‐text review. At each stage, teams of two review authors will independently assess all potential studies in duplicate using a priori inclusion and exclusion criteria. Data will be extracted by two review authors independently and in duplicate according to a standardised data extraction form.
Main Results
The results of this review will be used to inform the development of guidance for multi‐stakeholder engagement in guideline development and implementation. This guidance will be official GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) Working Group guidance. The GRADE system is internationally recognised as a standard for guideline development. The findings of this review will assist organisations who develop healthcare, public health and health policy guidelines, such as the World Health Organization, to involve multiple stakeholders in the guideline development process to ensure the development of relevant, high quality and transparent guidelines.
The WHO
include a recommendation to provide sensory stimulation or play therapy for children with severe acute malnutrition (SAM). This systematic review was performed to synthesize evidence around ...this recommendation. Specifically, the objective was to answer the question: "In children with severe acute malnutrition, does psychosocial stimulation improve child developmental, nutritional, or other outcomes?"
A review protocol was registered on the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO 2016: CRD42016036403). MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, and PsycINFO were searched with terms related to SAM and psychosocial stimulation. Studies were selected if they applied a stimulation intervention in children with SAM and child developmental and nutritional outcomes were assessed. Findings were presented within a narrative synthesis and a summary of findings table. Quality of the evidence was evaluated using the Cochrane risk of bias tool and the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach.
Only two studies, both non-randomized controlled trials, met the selection criteria for this review. One was conducted in Jamaica (1975) with a follow-up period of 14 years; the other was done in Bangladesh (2002) with a six-month follow-up. At the individual study level, each of the included studies demonstrated significant differences in child development outcomes between intervention and control groups. Only the study conducted in Bangladesh demonstrated a clinically significant increase in weight-for-age z-scores in the intervention group compared to the control group.
The evidence supporting the recommendation of psychosocial stimulation for children with SAM is not only sparse, but also of very low quality across important outcomes. High-quality trials are needed to determine the effects of psychosocial stimulation interventions on outcomes in children with SAM.
Established in 2015, the Multi-Stakeholder Engagement (MuSE) Consortium is an international network of over 120 individuals interested in stakeholder engagement in research and guidelines. The MuSE ...group is developing guidance for stakeholder engagement in the development of health and healthcare guideline development. The development of this guidance has included multiple meetings with stakeholders, including patients, payers/purchasers of health services, peer review editors, policymakers, program managers, providers, principal investigators, product makers, the public, and purchasers of health services and has identified a number of key issues. These include: (1) Definitions, roles, and settings (2) Stakeholder identification and selection (3) Levels of engagement, (4) Evaluation of engagement, (5) Documentation and transparency, and (6) Conflict of interest management. In this paper, we discuss these issues and our plan to develop guidance to facilitate stakeholder engagement in all stages of the development of health and healthcare guideline development.
This is the protocol for a Campbell systematic review. The overall objective of this study is to gather and summarize the existing literature on conflict of interest issues when engaging stakeholders ...in guideline development.
Abstract This is the protocol for a Campbell systematic review. The objectives are as follows: to identify, describe, and summarize existing guidance and methods for multistakeholder engagement ...throughout the health guideline development process.
The relationship between sugar and health is affected by energy balance, macronutrient substitutions, and diet and lifestyle patterns. Several authoritative organizations have issued public health ...guidelines addressing dietary sugars.
To systematically review guidelines on sugar intake and assess consistency of recommendations, methodological quality of guidelines, and the quality of evidence supporting each recommendation.
MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Web of Science (1995 to September 2016); guideline registries; and gray literature (bibliographies, Google, and experts).
Guidelines addressing sugar intake that reported their methods of development and were published in English between 1995 and 2016.
Three reviewers independently assessed guideline quality using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation, 2nd edition (AGREE II), instrument. To assess evidence quality, articles supporting recommendations were independently reviewed and their quality was determined by using GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) methods.
The search identified 9 guidelines that offered 12 recommendations. Each of the reviewed guidelines indicated a suggested decrease in the consumption of foods containing nonintrinsic sugars. The guidelines scored poorly on AGREE II criteria, specifically in rigor of development, applicability, and editorial independence. Seven recommendations provided nonquantitative guidance; 5 recommended less than 25% to less than 5% of total calories from nonintrinsic sugars. The recommendations were based on various health concerns, including nutrient displacement, dental caries, and weight gain. Quality of evidence supporting recommendations was low to very low.
The authors conducted the study independent of the funding source, which is primarily supported by the food and agriculture industry.
Guidelines on dietary sugar do not meet criteria for trustworthy recommendations and are based on low-quality evidence. Public health officials (when promulgating these recommendations) and their public audience (when considering dietary behavior) should be aware of these limitations.
Technical Committee on Dietary Carbohydrates of the North American branch of the International Life Sciences Institute. (PROSPERO: CRD42015029182).
The evaluation of patients with chronic watery diarrhea represents a diagnostic challenge for clinicians because organic causes, including inflammatory bowel disease, microscopic colitis, and chronic ...infection, must be differentiated from functional diarrhea and diarrhea-predominant irritable bowel syndrome. The purpose of this review is to summarize the available evidence on the usefulness of diagnostic tests in such patients.
We searched MEDLINE and EMBASE via OVID, from 1978 until April 2017. We included diagnostic test accuracy studies reporting on the use of fecal and blood tests for the evaluation of adult patients with functional diarrhea, including irritable bowel syndrome. We assessed the risk of bias of included studies using a modified version of the Quality Assessment of Diagnostic Accuracy Studies II, and the certainty in the evidence using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation) approach. We calculated pooled sensitivity and specificity, and the proportion of patients with true and false positive and negative results. We evaluated the following tests: erythrocyte sedimentation rate, C-reactive protein, fecal lactoferrin, fecal calprotectin, serologic tests for celiac disease, tests for bile acid diarrhea, the commercially available version of anti–cytolethal distending toxin B and anti-vinculin antibodies, and tests for Giardia infection. We did not evaluate breath tests for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, as they are not part of a standard diarrhea workup.
Thirty-eight studies proved eligible to evaluate 1 or more of these tests. Erythrocyte sedimentation rate and C-reactive protein were similar at discriminating organic from functional disease, with sensitivity and specificity, respectively, of 0.54–0.78 and 0.46–0.95 for erythrocyte sedimentation rate and 0.73 and 0.78 for C-reactive protein. Among fecal tests, fecal calprotectin in a range of 50–60 μg/g (pooled sensitivity 0.81; 95% confidence interval CI, 0.75–0.86; pooled specificity 0.87; 95% CI, 0.78–0.92) and fecal lactoferrin in a range of 4.0–7.25 μg/g (pooled sensitivity 0.79; 95% CI, 0.73–0.84; pooled specificity 0.93; 95%CI 0.63–0.99) presented the lowest proportion of false-negative results (low certainty in the evidence). Among tests for celiac disease, IgA tissue transglutaminase presented the best diagnostic test accuracy (sensitivity range, 0.79–0.99; specificity range, 0.90–0.99) with moderate certainty in the evidence. Among tests for bile acid diarrhea, the 75selenium homotaurocholic acid test performed better than serum fibroblast growth factor 19 and 7α-hydroxy-4-cholesten-3-one, but is not available in the United States. There was insufficient evidence to recommend serologic tests for irritable bowel syndrome at this time. There are several good diagnostic tests for Giardia infection.
Moderate to low certainty in the evidence indicates that available fecal and blood tests may play a role in the diagnostic workup of adult patients with functional diarrhea. At the moment, no tests are available to reliably rule in irritable bowel syndrome.
Strong international commitment and the widespread use of antiretroviral therapy have led to higher longevity for people living with human immune deficiency virus (HIV). Text messaging interventions ...have been shown to improve health outcomes in people living with HIV. The objectives of this overview were to: map the state of the evidence of text messaging interventions, identify knowledge gaps, and develop a framework for the transfer of evidence to other chronic diseases.
We conducted a systematic review of systematic reviews on text messaging interventions to improve health or health related outcomes. We conducted a comprehensive search of PubMed, EMBASE (Exerpta Medica Database), CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature), PsycINFO, Web of Science (WoS) and the Cochrane Library on the 17th April 2014. Screening, data extraction and assessment of methodological quality were done in duplicate. Our findings were used to develop a conceptual framework for transfer.
Our search identified 135 potential systematic reviews of which nine were included, reporting on 37 source studies, conducted in 19 different countries. Seven of nine (77.7%) of these reviews were high quality. There was some evidence for text messaging as a tool to improve adherence to antiretroviral therapy. Text messages also improved attendance at appointments and behaviour change outcomes. The findings were inconclusive for self-management of illness, treatment of tuberculosis and communicating results of medical investigations. The geographical distribution of text messaging research was limited to specific regions of the world. Prominent knowledge gaps included the absence of data on long term outcomes, patient satisfaction, and economic evaluations. The included reviews also identified methodological limitations in many of the primary studies.
Global evidence supports the use of text messaging as a tool to improve adherence to medication and attendance at scheduled appointments. Given the similarities between HIV and other chronic diseases (long-term medications, life-long care, strong link to behaviour and the need for home-based support) evidence from HIV may be transferred to these diseases using our proposed framework by integration of HIV and chronic disease services or direct transfer.
ObjectiveEvaluate effectiveness, harms and burdens of faecal blood testing, sigmoidoscopy and colonoscopy screening for colorectal cancer over 15 years.DesignWe performed an update of a Cochrane ...systematic review, and performed network meta-analysis comparing randomised trials evaluating colorectal cancer screening with guaiac faecal occult blood test (gFOBT) (annual, biennial), faecal immunochemical test (FIT) (annual, biennial), sigmoidoscopy (once-only) or colonoscopy (once-only) in a healthy population, aged 50–79 years. We conducted subgroup analysis on sex. Follow-up >5 years was required for analysis of colorectal cancer incidence and mortality.Results12 randomised trials proved eligible. Compared with no-screening, we found high certainty evidence for sigmoidoscopy screening slightly reducing colorectal cancer incidence (relative risk (RR) 0.76; 95% confidence interval (CI 0.70 to 0.83) and mortality (RR 0.74; 95% CI 0.69 to 0.80), while gFOBT screening had little or no difference on colorectal cancer incidence, but slightly reduced colorectal cancer mortality (annual: RR 0.69; 95% CI 0.56 to 0.86, biennial: RR 0.88; 95% CI 0.82 to 0.93). No screening test reduced mortality nor incidence by more than six per 1000 screened over 15 years. Sigmoidoscopy had a greater effect in men, for both colorectal cancer incidence (women: RR 0.86; 95% CI 0.81 to 0.92, men: RR 0.75, 95% CI 0.71 to 0.79), and mortality (women: RR 0.85; 95% CI 0.71 to 0.96, men: RR 0.67; 95% CI 0.61 to 0.75) (moderate certainty).ConclusionsIn a 15-year perspective, sigmoidoscopy reduces colorectal cancer incidence, while sigmoidoscopy, annual and biennial gFOBT all reduce colorectal cancer mortality. Sigmoidoscopy may reduce colorectal cancer incidence and mortality more in men than in women.PROSPERO registration numberCRD42018093401.
It is a longstanding cultural norm to provide supplemental oxygen to sick patients regardless of their blood oxygen saturation A recent systematic review and meta-analysis has shown that too much ...supplemental oxygen increases mortality for medical patients in hospital For patients receiving oxygen therapy, aim for peripheral capillary oxygen saturation (SpO2) of ≤96% (strong recommendation) For patients with acute myocardial infarction or stroke, do not initiate oxygen therapy in patients with SpO2 ≥90% (for ≥93% strong recommendation, for 90-92% weak recommendation) A target SpO2 range of 90-94% seems reasonable for most patients and 88-92% for patients at risk of hypercapnic respiratory failure; use the minimum amount of oxygen necessary What is the best way to use oxygen therapy for patients with an acute medical illness? A systematic review published in the Lancet in April 2018 found that supplemental oxygen in inpatients with normal oxygen saturation increases mortality.1 Its authors concluded that oxygen should be administered conservatively, but they did not make specific recommendations on how to do it. Proposed limits range from 98% for most patients, to an upper limit of 92% for patients with risk of hypercapnic respiratory failure, such as patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.15 How this recommendation was created Our international panel included methodologists, a respiratory therapist/technician, a nurse, patient partners who have been hospitalised for an acute medical condition, pulmonologists, intensivists, internists, an anaesthesiologist, a cardiologist, emergency physicians, and a surgeon (see appendix 1 on bmj.com for details of panel members). ...in the largest of eight trials of patients with stroke only 240 patients (3.1% of 7677 participants) had an initial SpO2 of 90-93.9%.16 For myocardial infarction, six trials enrolled 7898 patients: in the largest trial, 1062 patients (16.0%) had an initial SpO2 ≤94%.17 For all outcomes, the panel rated down the quality of the evidence for indirectness (uncertain applicability) in patients with a SpO2 of 90-92%. Because trials informing the lower limit of when to start oxygen were restricted to patients with stroke and myocardial infarction, whether the evidence applies to patients without these conditions is uncertain. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease Obesity hypoventilation Neuromuscular respiratory diseases Obstructive sleep apnoea Decreased central respiratory drive (such as sedative overdose, stroke, encephalitis) Higher target (such as SpO2 approaching 100%) Carbon monoxide poisoning Cluster headaches Sickle cell crisis Pneumothorax Shared decision making The patient panellists said that oxygen therapy is often given to patients with insufficient discussion and explanation.