Investigation on ophthalmologists’ cognition and application of clinical practice guidelines

Objective：To evaluate ophthalmologists’ knowledge and attitudes towards clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) and its application, find out the existing problems in the promotion and application of CPGs at present, and to explore possible solutions. Methods：The status of recognition and implementation of CPGs was investigated through both web-based and paper-based questionnaires. The data were analyzed by using statistic description, Kruskal-Wallis test and Spearman correlation analysis. Results：Five hundred and five valid questionnaires were retrieved, including 222 paper questionnaires (93.3% valid) and 283 web questionnaires (99.3% valid). In total, 95.4% of participants agreed that clinical guidelines are “important” or “very important” for clinical practice, but only 10.9% of participants agreed that the coverage of clinical guidelines is “enough”. There were statistical significances in terms of recognition scores among participants with different professional titles, educational levels, and hospital levels (P<0.05). Implementation scores among participants with different educational and hospital levels were statistically significant (P<0.001). Spearman correlation test showed that the recognition scores were correlated with participants’ educational levels, professional titles, and hospital levels (P<0.05), while the implementation scores were correlated with participants’ professional titles and hospital levels (P<0.001). Conclusions：While the importance of CPGs is well recognized, some participants showed poor performance in recognition and implementation of CPGs. Further effort on CPGs development and promotion is needed.