Managing conflicts of interest in the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) clinical guidelines programme: qualitative study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

There is international concern that conflicts of interest (COI) may bias clinical guideline development and render it untrustworthy. Guideline COI policies exist with the aim of reducing this bias but it is not known how such policies are interpreted and used by guideline producing organisations. This study sought to determine how conflicts of interest (COIs) are disclosed and managed by a national clinical guideline developer (NICE: the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence).

Methods

Qualitative study using semi-structured telephone interviews with 14 key informants: 8 senior staff of NICE's guideline development centres and 6 chairs of guideline development groups (GDGs). We conducted a thematic analysis.

Results

Participants regard the NIC

SUBMITTER: Graham T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4374927 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature