Table 1 Open in new tab Pros and cons of...

Table 1

Pros and cons of the clinical guidelines

Six good reasons why we should not follow guidelines

1. They focus on the disease rather than on the patient.
2. Their recommendations are based more often on expert opinions than on solid EBM.
3. They usually refer to studies conducted on relatively young patients with a low comorbidity burden.
4. They deter individual reasoning and suppress the deductive element of diagnostic decision-making in the individual patient.
5. They attenuate scientific curiosity and the motivation for further research by shifting attention from what we (still) don’t know to what we know (consolidated evidence).
6. They are the product of a ‘lobby’ of authors, often with strong links with pharmaceutical or biomedical companies.

Six good reasons why we should use the guidelines

1. They are an exceptional tool summarizing the latest published research.
2. They provide a useful ‘checklist’ of possible treatments to consider in the individual patient.
3. They explain the general rationale behind each diagnosis.
4. They outline the principles and steps for making diagnostic and therapeutic decisions.
5. They promote a more rational use of economic resources.
6. They provide a convenient line of defense in the event of malpractice charges.