Inefficacy of different strategies to improve guideline awareness – 5-year follow-up of the hypertension evaluation project (HEP)
2008

Improving Awareness of Hypertension Guidelines Among Doctors

Sample size: 8325 publication Evidence: moderate

Author Information

Author(s): Jens Hagemeister, Christian A Schneider, Holger Diedrichs, Diana Mebus, Holger Pfaff, Gernot Wassmer, Hans W Höpp

Primary Institution: University of Cologne

Hypothesis

Can different strategies effectively improve guideline awareness among physicians?

Conclusion

The study found that none of the interventions significantly improved guideline awareness among physicians, although overall knowledge increased over five years.

Supporting Evidence

  • Guideline awareness improved from 23.7% to 37.1% over five years.
  • The return rate of questionnaires was 57.9%.
  • No significant difference in guideline knowledge was found between trained physicians and the control group.

Takeaway

Doctors didn't learn much more about hypertension guidelines from the different training methods used, but overall knowledge did get a little better over five years.

Methodology

The study used three strategies to train physicians and compared their guideline knowledge to a control group.

Potential Biases

The study may have been affected by contamination from other sources of information about guidelines.

Limitations

The response rate was 57.9%, and there may have been contamination from other exposures to guideline information over five years.

Participant Demographics

Participants included general practitioners, internists, and cardiologists from Germany.

Statistical Information

P-Value

p < 0.0001

Statistical Significance

p < 0.0001

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

10.1186/1745-6215-9-39

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