(Brussels, Belgium) – – – Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) and Cochrane Kidney and Transplant (CKT) have launched a new collaboration to consolidate information on kidney disease guidelines and to make this resource globally accessible on the KDIGO website. Guidelines published by kidney organizations around the world will be identified, included in a searchable database, and updated periodically. Anyone seeking information on guidelines will be able to access the site at www.kdigo.org and learn what has been covered, and when and what recommendations were made by each guideline group.
KDIGO and CKT are global organizations with extensive experience in scientific evidence review and guideline development. They will work collaboratively to make it possible for clinicians anywhere in the world to access information on guidelines that have been written or are being planned.
KDIGO co-chair Bert Kasiske said, “KDIGO feels that this service to the global kidney community will help all of us access and search guideline information to answer clinical questions that we face in our daily practice. CKT is a stellar organization that has a unique capacity to make this project a reality.”
CKT chair Jonathan Craig added, “We are happy to work with KDIGO and bring our expertise in evidence review to this collaboration to serve our colleagues around the world. They will be able to find on one website information on current and future guidelines in our field.”
The collaboration was announced at a guideline coordination meeting organized by KDIGO during the International Society of Nephrology’s World Congress of Nephrology in Cape Town, South Africa. Representatives from more than a dozen guideline development groups attended the meeting and were invited to include their work in this project. As the global guideline developer, KDIGO has a responsibility to catalogue work conducted by regional or country societies of nephrology into a meaningful resource that is readily available. Work on the collaboration has begun, with the first data appearing online within the next six months.
Kasiske went on, “KDIGO is funding and leading this effort so that coordinated information can guide our decision making. The updates will keep our guidelines fresh and current. We feel that making this information available to the widest possible audience will help everyone, especially our patients.”
“This is only the beginning of our collaboration with CKT”, said KDIGO co-chair David Wheeler. “In the future, we intend to extract recommendations from all available guidelines and make these searchable to assist in clinical decision making.”
Dr. Wheeler went on, “Later we hope to include information on new clinical trials that may support or contradict existing guidelines. This will help clinicians decide whether a guideline is still relevant and whether new data has supported or undermined a specific recommendation.”
KDIGO is committed to keeping its own guidelines up-to-date. The collaboration with Cochrane Kidney and Transplant is intended to make this process easier, faster and more cost effective. Knowing when new clinical trials are published will help guideline work groups decide when a recommendation requires updating. This, along with electronic publishing techniques, will keep KDIGO guidelines alive and continually relevant.
KDIGO is a Belgian foundation committed to developing and implementing nephrology guidelines that improve patient outcomes on a global basis.
For further information please contact KDIGO at KDIGOcommunications@kdigo.org.
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