AHCPR clearinghouse to go on-line as scheduled
AHCPR clearinghouse to go on-line as scheduled
The Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (AHCPR) projects a Dec. 15 debut of the National Guideline Clearinghouse (NGC). According to an AHCPR spokeswoman, the project sponsored in partnership with the American Association of Health Plans and the American Medical Association is "totally on schedule, which is so unusual for something of this size."
The NGC will have its own World Wide Web address, available free of charge (http://www.guideline.gov).
On opening day, the NGC will offer "a few hundred guidelines," according to AHCPR’s source, "and we will be adding more all the time." Ultimately, the NGC will contain thousands of guidelines, indexed by key recommendations and assessments for various audiences including providers and health care systems.
Users can find guidelines by searching on the guideline topic or developer. The elements of each guideline will include:
• Standardized abstract of the guideline’s content and how it was developed.
• Full text of the guideline, if available, or links to the full text as well as information on how to obtain the full text.
• Comparisons of guidelines that cover similar topic areas, with major interventions and areas of agreement and disagreement.
• Topic-related electronic mail groups where registered users may exchange information about aspects of guideline development, content, and implementation.
Submitting guidelines
Submissions of guidelines are welcome, according to AHCPR’s spokeswoman. The submission criteria specify two typed paper copies of each guideline, accompanied by related background information such as peer-reviewed journal articles. An electronic version, on disk, of the guideline is also requested if available. Include contact information as well: name, business address, telephone, and e-mail address. Send the information to Vivian Coates, NGC, project director, ECRI, 5200 Butler Pike, Plymouth Meeting, PA 19462.
For more information about NGC, contact Jean Slutsky, NGC project officer, AHCPR, Center for Practice and Technology Assessment, 6000 Executive Blvd., Suite 310, Rockville, MD 20852. Telephone: (301) 594-4015. Fax: (301) 594-4027. E-mail: [email protected].
For Internet access to more information about NGC before Dec. 15, visit World Wide Web: http://www.ahcpr.gov; click on Clinical Information. For background on the clearinghouse, see QI/TQM’s Quality Talk, August 1998, p. 113, with John M. Eisenberg, MD, administrator of AHCPR.
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