Matching guideline questions to Cochrane Review questions – a linked data test case

Article type
Authors
Brandt L1, Tritton R2
1MAGIC
2Cochrane Innovations
Abstract
Background: Both guidelines and systematic reviews have defined clinical questions (Population Intervention Comparison Outcome - PICOs) at their core. Current standards for trustworthy guidelines mandate authors to use systematic reviews when developing guidelines. We have little knowledge about the overlap of PICOs needed for guidelines and those currently available from published systematic reviews. Cochrane and MAGIC are jointly exploring the potential mapping between PICOs used in current guidelines and relevant PICOs in Cochrane Reviews.

Objectives: To map the PICOs in guidelines with corresponding Cochrane Reviews, to:
- Find the degree of overlap of the PICOs;
- explore automatic mapping using PICO metadata (PICO annotation) and linked data technologies;
- explore if such mappings can help guideline authors more effectively identify reviews relevant to them; and,
- explore if such mappings can help systematic review-production prioritisation, by identification of answers needed by guideline producers.

Methods: Guidelines published on the MAGIC platform are mapped by comparing their PICOs with PICOs from existing Cochrane systematic reviews. Both manual and automated data mappings are used, and a comparison made between the two. Respective Cochrane Review Groups and guideline authors are engaged in the analysis.

Results: We will demonstrate:
• A series of mappings between PICO data in guidelines on the MAGIC platform and in Cochrane reviews;
• how 'PICO annotation' – the creation of PICO metadata – has been used to enhance discovery of links between guidelines in MAGIC and reviews in Cochrane;
• how prototype software has been developed for the automated finding of PICO-based links; and,
• insights and lessons learned from manual matching and automated linking respectively.

Discussion: We will discuss ways in which PICO-based links between guidelines and systematic reviews might be useful for guideline developers and systematic review groups.