Photo Credit: Mohammed Haneefa Nizamudeen
The following is a summary of “Reproducibility of the AGREE II Tool for Assessing the Methodological Quality of Clinical Practice Guidelines for the Management of Antithrombotic Agents in Patients Undergoing GI Endoscopy,” published in the September 2024 issue of Gastroenterology by Dayto et al.
Despite the existence of Clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) for periendoscopic antithrombotic management, their quality varies, and the reproducibility of the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research & Evaluation II (AGREE II) tool for assessing them remains unknown.
Researchers conducted a retrospective study to evaluate the reproducibility of the AGREE II tool for recent CPGs on antithrombotic management during endoscopy.
They systematically searched PubMed and Embase databases to identify eligible CPGs (January 1, 2016, and April 14, 2022). The quality of the CPG was independently assessed by 6 reviewers using the AGREE II instrument. The reproducibility was summarized as weighted κ statistic and intraclass correlation coefficient using the SPSS statistical analysis package.
The results showed 343 citations with 7 CPGs from Europe, Asia, and the United States included in the critical appraisal. The overall mean weighted κ score across all guidelines was 0.300 (range, 0.093 to 0.384), indicating a fair agreement. The overall intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.462 (range, 0.175 to 0.570) for single measures and 0.837 (range, 0.560 to 0.888) for average measures indicating moderate reliability.
They concluded that the AGREE II tool showed limited interobserver agreement for assessing CPG quality, highlighting the need for training to improve its application and reproducibility.
Source: journals.lww.com/jcge/abstract/9900/reproducibility_of_the_agree_ii_tool_for_assessing.343.aspx