When no evidence is available, CPG developers should change search strategies, scope of the questions and promotion strategies. Providing a flow chart to include equity in CPGs Four studies19 20 28–31 were included in the ‘Providing a flow chart to include equity in CPGs’ theme. These included following common steps: identifying questions, developing http://www.selleckchem.com/products/Nilotinib.html search strategies, appraising scientific evidence, synthesising the evidence, formulating recommendations and writing the guideline documents. Almost all of the elements in this theme were captured by the other

themes except ‘Synthesising the evidence’. This additional element suggests that CPG developers should analyse subgroup effects, describe different/inconsistent evidence, balance harms and benefits and consult comments from stakeholders. Others: reporting of guidelines and comments from stakeholders Keuken et al31 reported the knowledge needs for the various ways of reporting guidelines. The authors stated that CPGs developers should balance advantages and disadvantages of different reporting methods. NICE28 29 highlighted the need for engagement with stakeholders during every stage of the development process. For the CPGs users Assessing the

quality of CPGs Dans et al21 reported how CPG users can assess the quality of CPGs. This study includes limited guidance, including whether recommendations considered priorities for disadvantaged populations, and factors to explore differential effects across groups during the scoping stage. The authors suggest CPG users assess whether differential effects of the intervention across groups are valued, consider these when implementing the recommendations in practice, and address barriers to implementation, and the impact of the recommendations. Discussion Summary of evidence We identified eight

studies with 10 publications focusing on how to address equity issues in guidelines. Using different definitions Drug_discovery of health equity the eight guiding studies may result in the difference of identifying the same conditions related to equity. Few studies provided methodological guidance to help CPG users identify important information on equity. After qualitative analysis, eight themes were identified, which included ‘scoping questions’, ‘searching relevant evidence’, ‘appraising evidence’, ‘formulating recommendations’, ‘monitoring implementation’, ‘providing a flow chart to include equity in CPGs’, and ‘others: reporting of guidelines and comments from stakeholders’ for CPG developers and ‘assessing the quality of CPGs’ for CPG users.