The American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD) is committed to producing practice guidelines that are trustworthy, methodologically sound, and rigorous, and adhere to the highest existing standards.
AASLD recognizes that programs should be regularly reviewed and modified as the needs of the community and the association strategies evolve. As a result of this, the practice guideline program and its processes are being revised to better reflect the needs of our community. To produce trustworthy guidelines that meet industry standards, including transparency around the process for development of and grading of the recommendations, and a streamlined creation and writing process, AASLD is evolving the program to prioritize these aspects:
- AASLD will expand use of the GRADE approach to guideline statement development and assessment. Committee members are being offered the opportunity for GRADE training and a senior methodologist will be incorporated into committee membership to oversee the process of guideline development. The development of Practice Guidances has been discontinued.
- In addition to clinical experts and methodologists, all guideline writing groups will include patient representatives throughout the process.
- Beginning in mid-2024, special interest group (SIG) members will be able to propose topics for future guidelines through an online topic nomination process.
- An open public comment period will occur for all guidelines.
- Conflicts of interest for all guidelines will continue to be managed according to AASLD’s COI policy, through the Ethics Committee.
- To remain uninfluenced and unbiased, writing group members will remain confidential until the guideline is published. Guideline recommendations will remain confidential until the public comment period is open.
Stay tuned for more information on AASLD’s guideline development process, patient involvement in guidelines, the topic nomination process, and how you can become involved in developing AASLD’s essential resource.