Evidence-based evaluation of guidelines for hypertensive disorders of pregnancy / 中华围产医学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To quantitatively evaluate the guidelines for hypertensive disorders of pregnancy (HDP) at home and abroad, and to provide a reference for the development of related guidelines in the future.Methods:Guidelines related to HDP published at home and abroad from 1 January 2018 to 31 December 2022 were retrieved from several databases, including CNKI, Wanfang Database, Yiigle, VIP Database, PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science with the terms of "hypertension in pregnancy", "hypertensive disorders of pregnancy", "pre-eclampsia", "eclampsia", and "guidelines". The retrieved guidelines were evaluated with the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation Ⅱ (AGREE Ⅱ) and Scientific, Transparent and Applicable Rankings (STAR) tool. According to the manual of AGREE Ⅱ two researchers graded the retrieved guidelines from six domains: scope and purpose, participants, rigor, clarity, applicability, and independence. Mean standardized score of each domain and the overall score were obtained. STAR tool was used to grade the guidelines by two researchers and one methodologist from 11 domains: registration, protocol, funding, working groups, conflicts of interest, clinical issues, evidence, consensus methods, recommendations, accessibility, and others.Results:A total of 19 related guidelines were included, covering six countries on three continents. The mean standardized scores of the 19 guidelines in the six domains of scope and purpose, participants, rigor, clarity, applicability, and independence using the AGREE II instrument were 73.98%, 63.16%, 59.98%, 66.37%, 56.36%, and 71.93%, respectively. Scores in the 11 domains of registration, protocol, funding, working groups, conflicts of interest, clinical issues, evidence, consensus methods, recommendations, accessibility, and others using the STAR tool were 0.00%, 0.00%, 76.15%, 39.87%, 58.92%, 65.19%, 60.80%, 49.78%, 78.95%, 30.89%, and 42.11%, respectively. According to the overall evaluation results, 12 guidelines were recommended and seven needed further modifications. It was found that most guidelines were unanimous in their recommendations on the prevention of preeclampsia with aspirin, medications for patients with severe hypertension, and the timing of pregnancy termination in preeclampsia patients, with the consensus rates of 10/13, 9/13, and 9/13, respectively. Besides, these recommendations were supported by substantial evidence.Conclusions:The overall quality of guidelines related to HDP at home and abroad is high, but there is still room for improvement. When developing relevant guidelines in the future, statisticians and methodologists should be included in the working groups to improve the evidence-based quality, and much attention should be paid to the disclosure of conflicts of interest guidelines. Registration and protocol are needed before publishing a guideline. The development of multiple versions for different users will conduce to improving the management of HDP.