View source for Consensus (medical)

'''Medical consensus''' is a public statement on a particular aspect of [[medicine|medical]] knowledge available at the time it was written, and that is generally agreed upon as the [[Evidence-based medicine|evidence-based]], [[State of the art|state-of-the-art]] (or state-of-science) knowledge by a representative group of experts in that area. Its main objective is to counsel physicians on the best possible and acceptable way to diagnose and treat certain [[disease]]s or how to address a particular [[decision-making]] area. Therefore, it can be considered an authoritative, community-based [[consensus decision-making]] and publication process. 

There are many ways of producing medical consensus, but the most usual way is to convene an independent panel of experts, either by a [[medical association]] or by a governmental authority. In the [[United States]], for example, the [[National Institutes of Health]] promotes about five to six consensus panels per year, and organizes this knowledge by means of a special Consensus Development Program, managed by its NIH Office of Medical Applications of Research (OMAR). The statements are available in printed form as well as for downloading from the Internet (see link below).

Since consensus statements provide a "snapshot in time" of the state of knowledge in a particular topic, it must periodically be re-evaluated and published again, substituting the previous consensus statement.

Consensus statements differ from [[Guideline (medical)|medical guidelines]], another form of state-of-science public statements. According to the NIH, "Consensus statements synthesize new information, largely from recent or ongoing [[medical research]], that has implications for reevaluation of routine medical practices. They do not give specific [[algorithm]]s or guidelines for practice. Such policy decisions often depend on cost, available expertise and technology, and local practice circumstances."

==See also==
* [[Medical decision making]]
* [[Evidence-based medicine]]
* [[Medical literature]]
* [[Medical research]]
* [[Guideline (medical)]]
* [[Journal_club | Journal Club]]
* [[Algorithm (medical)]]

==External links==
* [http://consensus.nih.gov/ NIH Consensus Development Program]


[[Category:Medical terms]]
[[Category:Healthcare quality]]
[[Category:2Fix]]