Clinical Guidelines

This is the second in a series of four articles on issues in the development and use of clinical guidelines. The methods of guideline development should ensure that treating patients according to the guidelines will achieve the outcomes that are desired. This article presents a combination of the literature about guideline development and the results of the authors' experience in guideline development in North America and Britain. It considers the five steps in the initial development of an evidence-based guideline. The dissemination, implementation, and evaluation of practice guidelines will be discussed in the final article in this series.