Factors Affecting Family Physicians' Use of Clinical Practice Guidelines

IF 2.1 4区医学 Q3 HEALTH CARE SCIENCES & SERVICES

Journal of evaluation in clinical practice Pub Date : 2025-08-21 DOI:10.1111/jep.70228

Ismail Cifci, Esra Meltem Koc

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background

Clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) are widely used globally, yet their utilisation by family physicians varies between countries. Despite the known benefits of CPGs, limited data exist regarding their use among family physicians in Turkey.

Aim

The aim of this study is to determine the CPG usage status and influencing factors of family physicians in primary care settings.

Methods

A questionnaire with Likert-scale response options was administered to 384 family physicians working in Family Health Centres affiliated with the Ministry of Health. The survey gathered demographic data and assessed physicians' awareness, knowledge, and behaviours regarding CPGs use. Chi-square tests and descriptive statistics were used in the analysis, with a significance level set at p < 0.05.

Findings

Of the 384 physicians, 196 (51%) were male, with a mean age of 44.5 years (SD: 9.7), and 257 (66.9%) were general practitioners. A total of 297 physicians (77.3%) had previously used CPGs, with usage significantly higher among resident physicians (96.5%; p < 0.001). The most used guidelines were for hypertension (88.2%), diabetes (87.2%), and thyroid diseases (54.2%). Regarding opinions on CPGs, 77.1% of participants agreed that guidelines improve treatment effectiveness and reduce healthcare costs, while 73.9% indicated they would use guidelines more often if they had sufficient time. However, 69.7% disagreed with that guidelines limit their autonomy as physicians. The main barriers to guidelines used included time constraints and the overwhelming number of guidelines available.

Conclusion

Family physicians widely use CPGs, yet workload and accessibility remain significant barriers. Policies to improve access and streamline guideline use in practice are warranted.

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影响家庭医生使用临床实践指南的因素

临床实践指南（CPGs）在全球范围内被广泛使用，但家庭医生对其的使用因国家而异。尽管已知cpg的好处，但关于其在土耳其家庭医生中的使用的数据有限。目的了解基层家庭医生CPG使用现状及影响因素。方法采用李克特量表对卫生部家庭保健中心384名家庭医生进行问卷调查。该调查收集了人口统计数据，并评估了医生对cpg使用的认识、知识和行为。分析采用卡方检验和描述性统计，显著性水平设置为p <； 0.05。384名医生中，男性196名（51%），平均年龄44.5岁（SD: 9.7），全科医生257名（66.9%）。共有297名医生（77.3%）曾使用过cpg，其中住院医师的使用率显著高于住院医师（96.5%;p < 0.001）。使用最多的指南是高血压（88.2%）、糖尿病（87.2%）和甲状腺疾病（54.2%）。关于CPGs的意见，77.1%的参与者同意指南提高了治疗效果并降低了医疗成本，而73.9%的参与者表示，如果他们有足够的时间，他们会更频繁地使用指南。然而，69.7%的人不同意指导方针限制了他们作为医生的自主权。使用指导方针的主要障碍包括时间限制和现有指导方针数量过多。结论家庭医生广泛使用CPGs，但工作量和可及性仍存在较大障碍。有必要制定政策，以改善获取和简化指南在实践中的使用。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Journal of evaluation in clinical practice 医学-卫生保健

CiteScore

4.80

自引率

4.20%

发文量

143

审稿时长

3-8 weeks

期刊介绍： The Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice aims to promote the evaluation and development of clinical practice across medicine, nursing and the allied health professions. All aspects of health services research and public health policy analysis and debate are of interest to the Journal whether studied from a population-based or individual patient-centred perspective. Of particular interest to the Journal are submissions on all aspects of clinical effectiveness and efficiency including evidence-based medicine, clinical practice guidelines, clinical decision making, clinical services organisation, implementation and delivery, health economic evaluation, health process and outcome measurement and new or improved methods (conceptual and statistical) for systematic inquiry into clinical practice. Papers may take a classical quantitative or qualitative approach to investigation (or may utilise both techniques) or may take the form of learned essays, structured/systematic reviews and critiques.