Guideline watch

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Guideline watch
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The transparency portal for medical treatment guidelines
Guideline watch evaluates medical treatment guidelines for their independence from the pharmaceutical industry.
languages German, tw. English
founder Mezis, NeurologyFirst and Transparency Germany
On-line 2015 (currently active)
https://www.leitlinienwatch.de

Guideline watch evaluates medical treatment guidelines for their independence from the pharmaceutical and medical device industry. The rating system rewards measures that reduce the impact of conflicts of interest. Guideline watch is supported by Mezis , NeurologyFirst and Transparency Germany .

Origin and goal

Guideline Watch is a transparency portal founded in 2015, which examines medical guidelines based on various scientific criteria for their independence from the pharmaceutical and medical device industries and evaluates them using a fixed evaluation system. Guideline watch had examined and evaluated over 170 and thus the vast majority of all relevant guidelines in Germany by the beginning of 2019. Guideline watch is financed by Mezis eV and Neuro + eV, Berlin.

Approach and results

Guidelinewatch primarily examines all current guidelines of the Working Group of Scientific Medical Associations (AWMF), and in some cases European guidelines, such as those of the European Cardiological Society (ESC), are examined and evaluated due to their relevance for German patients. Based on the German recommendations of the AWMF and international scientific criteria of the Council of Medical Specialty Societies (CMSS) and the Institute of Medicine, the following points are analyzed in a guideline:

  • Disclosure and Independent Assessment of Conflicts of Interest
  • Minimizing the proportion of biased members of a guideline group
  • Lead authors without conflicts of interest
  • Abstention from voting if there are conflicts of interest
  • Internet-based discussion of the draft guideline by the professional community and patients

A guideline is analyzed by at least three evaluators from a 14-person team of doctors and medical students (as of February 10, 2019), according to defined procedures and standardized transparency and conflict of interest regulations for the evaluators. At the end of the analysis, the conclusion and points are awarded according to the traffic light scheme. The following results are currently (as of February 10, 2019) based on 175 evaluated guidelines with regard to their independence from the pharmaceutical industry:

  • Well! (15%)
  • Attention! (41%)
  • Need for reform! (45%)

The results were most recently published in a study in BMC Medical Ethics 2018: “The analysis of 67 German S3 guidelines showed that financial conflicts of interest are mostly disclosed by German guideline authors, but generally have no consequences. For example, guideline authors with conflicts of interest have so far hardly been induced to abstain from votes. A majority of authors with conflicts of interest were found in 55% of the guidelines evaluated. The coordinators were free of conflicts of interest in only 9% of the guidelines. "

Public perception, perception in the health sector

The work of guideline watch has recently been incorporated into several contributions to the medical device scandal Implant files, for example in the guideline on heart valves, which is prone to conflicts of interest. In the medical profession, there has been overwhelmingly positive feedback on guideline watch, particularly from the specialist societies and the AWMF, also because the evaluations are fed back to those involved and this results in a constructive discussion for future guidelines.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ AWMF rule for the guideline register: Declaration of interests and handling of conflicts of interest in guideline projects Version 2.4, status: January 17, 2018. Accessed January 11, 2019.
  2. ↑ a b CMSS Council of Medical Specialty Societies. Retrieved January 11, 2019.
  3. ^ A b The National Academies of Sciences Engineering Medicine. Health and Medicine Division. March 23, 2011: Clinical Practice Guidelines We Can Trust. Retrieved January 11, 2019.
  4. ↑ AWMF rule for the guideline register: Declaration of interests and handling of conflicts of interest in guideline projects Version 2.4, status: January 17, 2018 (pdf), accessed on January 11, 2019.
  5. ↑ Form for Conflicts of Interest - Guidelinewatch.de (pdf) Retrieved on January 11, 2019
  6. ↑ a b Hendrik Napierala, Luise Schäfer, Gisela Schott, Niklas Schurig and Thomas Lempert: Management of financial conflicts of interests in clinical practice guidelines in Germany: results from the public database GuidelineWatch . Ed .: BMC Medical Ethics. tape 19 . Springer Nature, June 28, 2018, p. 65 .
  7. ↑ Guideline on heart valves
  8. ↑ Markus Grill and Elena Kuch: Operation on an open wallet. In: www.ndr.de. NDR, November 27, 2018, accessed on February 10, 2019 .
  9. ↑ aerzteblatt.de