The Critical Assessment of the Quality of Common Clinical Guidelines for Administering Chemotherapy Drugs by Using AGREE II Tool

Abstract

Context: Administering chemotherapy drugs in patients with cancer is a complicated and risky process that may have the potential to harm patients and the healthcare team if not done safely. Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate the quality of current clinical guidelines for the administration of chemotherapy drugs by using the appraisal of guidelines for research & evaluation II (AGREE II) tool. Evidence Acquisition: After searching through authoritative databases and publishing clinical guidelines by institutions, the articles which were published between 2007 to August 2018 with selected keywords were reviewed and the clinical guidelines were evaluated independently by 5 experts using AGREE II tool based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The consensus between appraisers was examined using the ICC (intraclass correlation coefficient). Results: Among 51 clinical guidelines, 4 of them were matched with the inclusion criteria. All 4 clinical guidelines had a high level of quality, with a minimum score above 60 in their 5 domains. Domain 1(scope and purpose) obtained the highest score (95.27 ) and domain 3 (rigor of development) obtained the lowest score (84.89). The degree of agreement between evaluators was very good (0.84 - 0.95). Conclusions: The overall quality of current clinical guidelines for administering chemotherapy drugs which were evaluated by AGREE II tool, is satisfactory. Therefore, their clinical implementation is recommended to the entire health care team and nurses working in oncology departments, in order to improve the safety of patients and the health care team, and also to prevent the complications of chemotherapy.