Dr. Ian Olver presented an evaluation of a Digital Clinical Practice Guidelines Project undertaken by Cancer Council Australia

2013    At the MASCC/ISOO 2013 International Cancer Care Symposium in Berlin, Dr. Ian Olver presented an evaluation of a Digital Clinical Practice Guidelines Project undertaken by Cancer Council Australia, of which he is Chief Executive Officer.

Dr. Olver noted that a key problem with print guidelines is that they rapidly become outdated and are difficult to disseminate widely. The Cancer Council’s solution was to develop and test an Internet-based wiki platform that makes guidelines accessible to an international audience for review, comment, and update. All of the steps of guideline development were similar to those of published print guidelines: identifying questions, searching and appraising relevant literature, formulating evidence-based recommendations, and reporting the strength of the evidence.

In the wiki-platform approach, only the guideline developers can change a guideline, but experts and the public can comment at any time, and the developers respond to these comments. As new papers become available, they are posted on the wiki and the guideline authors decide whether the recommendations need altering. This approach allows for regular updating of the guidelines. This approach was tested using lung cancer guidelines. Results showed that both clinicians and the public readily engage with the wiki guidelines. The next step is to include an education module with the guidelines.