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Cited by 184

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 2 of the 2 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

The validity of recommendations from clinical guidelines: a survival analysis

Open access
García, Laura Martínez, Sanabria, Andrea Juliana, Álvarez, Elvira García, Trujillo-Martín, Maria Mar, Etxeandia-Ikobaltzeta, Itziar, Kotzeva, Anna, Rigau, David, Louro-González, Arturo, Barajas-Nava, Leticia, Campo, Petra Díaz del, Estrada, Maria-Dolors, Solà, Ivan, Gracia, Javier, Salcedo-Fernandez, Flavia, Lawson, Jennifer, Haynes, R. Brian, Alonso-Coello, Pablo·2014·Canadian Medical Association Journal

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Clinical guidelines should be updated to maintain their validity. Our aim was to estimate the length of time before recommendations become outdated. METHODS: We used a retrospective cohort design and included recommendations from clinical guidelines developed in the Spanish National Health System clinical guideline program since 2008. We performed a descriptive analysis of references, recommendations and resources used, and a survival analysis of recommendations using the Kaplan-Meier method. RESULTS: We included 113 recommendations from 4 clinical guidelines with a median of 4 years since the most recent search (range 3.9-4.4 yr). We retrieved 39 136 references (range 3343-14 787) using an exhaustive literature search, 668 of which were related to the recommendations in our sample. We identified 69 (10.3%) key references, corresponding to 25 (22.1%) recommendations that required updating. Ninety-two percent (95% confidence interval 86.9-97.0) of the recommendations were valid 1 year after their development. This probability decreased at 2 (85.7%), 3 (81.3%) and 4 years (77.8%). INTERPRETATION: Recommendations quickly become outdated, with 1 out of 5 recommendations being out of date after 3 years. Waiting more than 3 years to review a guideline is potentially too long.

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Metadata

Authors
García, L. M., Sanabria, A. J., Álvarez, E. G., Trujillo-Martín, M. M., Etxeandia-Ikobaltzeta, I., Kotzeva, A., Rigau, D., Louro-González, A., Barajas-Nava, L., Campo, P. D. D., Estrada, M.-D., Solà, I., Gracia, J., Salcedo-Fernandez, F., Lawson, J., Haynes, R. B., & Alonso-Coello, P.
Venue
Canadian Medical Association Journal
Published
2014-09-08
Volume
186
Issue
16
Pages
1211-1219
ISSN
  • 0820-3946 (ISSN-L)
  • 1488-2329
OpenAlex
W2124597509
Cited by
184
References
2
FWCI
10.11
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
gold

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CoChat. (2026). Citation check: The validity of recommendations from clinical guidelines: a survival analysis. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1503/cmaj.140547
The paper
García, L. M., Sanabria, A. J., Álvarez, E. G., Trujillo-Martín, M. M., Etxeandia-Ikobaltzeta, I., Kotzeva, A., Rigau, D., Louro-González, A., Barajas-Nava, L., Campo, P. D. D., Estrada, M.-D., Solà, I., Gracia, J., Salcedo-Fernandez, F., Lawson, J., Haynes, R. B., & Alonso-Coello, P. (2014). The validity of recommendations from clinical guidelines: a survival analysis. Canadian Medical Association Journal. https://doi.org/10.1503/cmaj.140547

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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).

Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.