Systems for grading the quality of evidence and the strength of recommendations II: Pilot study of a new system

David Atkins¹ , Peter A Briss² , Martin Eccles³ , Signe Flottorp⁴ , Gordon H Guyatt⁵ , Robin T Harbour⁶ , Suzanne Hill⁷ , Roman Jaeschke⁸ , Alessandro Liberati⁹ , Nicola Magrini¹⁰ , James Mason³ , Dianne O'Connell¹¹ , Andrew D Oxman⁴ , Bob Phillips¹² , Holger Schünemann^5,13 , Tessa Tan-Torres Edejer¹⁴ , Gunn E Vist⁴ , John W Williams Jr¹⁵ and The GRADE Working Group

¹  Center for Practice and Technology Assessment, Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, 540 Gaither Rd. Rokville, MD 20852, USA

²  Community Guide Branch, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, MS K73, 4770 Buford Highway, Atlanta, GA 30341, USA

³  Centre for Health Services Research, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 21 Claremont Place, Newcastle upon Tyne NE2 4AA, UK

⁴  Informed Choice Research Department, Norwegian Health Services Research Centre, Pb. 7004 St. Olavs Plass, 0130 Oslo, Norway

⁵  Departments of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Medicine, McMaster University, 1200 Main Street West, Hamilton, Ontario L8N 3Z5, Canada

⁶  Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network, 9 Queen Street, Edinburgh EH2 1JQ, UK

⁷  Department of Clinical Pharmacology, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, University of Newcastle, Level 5, New Med 2 Building, Newcastle Mater Hospital, Waratah, NSW 2298, Australia

⁸  Department of Medicine, McMaster University, 1200 Main Street West, Hamilton, Ontario L8N 3Z5, Canada

⁹  Department of Oncology and Hematology, Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Azienda Ospedaliera Policlinico, Via dal Pozzo 41, 41100 Modena, Italia and Centro per la Valutazione della Efficacia della Assistenza Sanitaria (CeVEAS), Modena, Italy

¹⁰  Centro per la Valutazione della Efficacia della Assistenza Sanitaria (CeVEAS), NHS Centre for the Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Health Care, Viale Muratori 201, Modena 41100, Italy

¹¹  Cancer Epidemiology Research Unit, Cancer Research and Registers Division, The Cancer Council NSW, PO Box 572, Kings Cross NSW 1340, Australia

¹²  Centre for Evidence-based Medicine, University Department of Psychiatry, Warneford Hospital, Oxford OX3 7JX, UK

¹³  Departments of Medicine and Social & Preventive Medicine, University at Buffalo, State University of New York, ECMC-CC142, 462 Grider St, Buffalo, NY 14215, USA

¹⁴  Global Programme on Evidence for Health Policy, World Health Organisation, CH-1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland

¹⁵  The Center for Health Services Research in Primary Care, HSR&D, Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center and Duke University Medical Center, 508 Fulton St., Durham, NC 27705, USA