The development process of the Philippine Living CPG follows the Philippine Department of Health’s Manual for Clinical Practice Guideline Development [DOH 2018] and the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation or GRADE Approach [Schünemann et al 2013].

The specific phases of the CPG development process are as follows:

1. Guideline Preparation – The Steering Committee identified and convened members of the Living CPG task force: Lead CPG Developer (Steering Committee), Evidence Review Experts or Technical Working Group (TWG) and the Consensus Panel. A total of 20 specialty societies and stakeholders are represented in the task force.

   The Steering Committee, together with the TWG and other key stakeholders, finalized the health questions to be addressed in the CPG. The Steering Committee selected the members of the Consensus Panel based on their knowledge and experience, and potential conflicts of interest in consultation with the heads of the professional medical societies and stakeholder organizations. The Consensus Panel is composed of multi-sectoral representatives such as practitioners, both specialists and non-specialists, and patient advocates. The panel members were selected from the designated representatives of the relevant specialty groups. Some stakeholders, such as nurses, acted as patient advocates to reflect patients’ and public’s views and preferences.

   Several orientation sessions were conducted for the technical reviewers and consensus panel members on the COVID CPG development process. Technical reviewers were re-trained on evidence synthesis and the GRADE methodology. Consensus panel members were oriented on how to interpret the evidence summaries and generate the GRADE evidence-to-decision framework.

2. Evidence Synthesis – Evidence Review Experts reviewed and appraised existing CPGs and published literature, prepared evidence summaries, and drafted evidence-based recommendations. They are composed of members with one or more of the following expertise: methodologists, clinical epidemiologists, evidence-based practitioners, etc. They ideally have attended previous training on CPG development and evidence synthesis, or have previous experience on CPG development.

   For each health question, a systematic literature search was done. All eligible studies were critically appraised independently by the assigned reviewers.

   Evidence tables and evidence summaries were generated by the TWG using the GRADE approach. Draft recommendations were formulated based on the quality of the evidence. All these steps were done by at least two independent reviewers.

   During this stage of development, several technical coordinators with expertise on CPG Development and Evidence-Based Medicine oversee the retrieval and appraisal of evidence and the creation of the draft recommendations. A writer ensured that the draft recommendations are uniform, concise and clear. The Steering Committee organized several practice sessions for the ERE to finalize their presentations, and discuss them with other EREs, Steering Committee and technical experts. Evidence summaries were collated, formatted and prepared for presentation to the consensus panel.

3. Evidence to Decision – Upon completion of the evidence summaries by the ERE, several en banc meetings with the Consensus Panel were conducted wherein the evidence summaries and draft recommendations were presented for discussion and consensus voting. The Consensus Panel ranked the outcomes for each set of clinical questions according to whether they were critical, important but not critical or of low importance for decision making. Critical outcomes were primary factors that should influence a recommendation, while those with lower importance did not bear on these recommendations. In a scale of 1-9, those rated 7-9 were critical outcomes, 4-6 were important but not critical outcomes and 1-3 were outcomes of limited importance. Grading of the strength of recommendations are based on the overall quality of the evidence, trade-offs between benefits and harms, values and preferences of patients, resource implications and impact on equity. A skilled facilitator moderated the discussions during this meeting.

   Each member voted on the draft recommendation as follows: yes, no, or abstain. Consensus was defined as at least 75% agreement among the members for both the direction and strength of recommendation. If consensus was not reached, members discussed the reasons in support of their votes for or against the recommendation. The voting was repeated, up to three times, until a consensus is reached. Any issues left unsettled after the en banc meeting were finalized through a modified Delphi activity.

4. Living CPG Process – From standard guideline development process above, several recommendations were prioritized to a living status according to the following: priority for decision making, reasonable chance that new evidence changes the existing recommendation, and likelihood of new research evidence [Akl et al, 2020]. Members of the EREs working on living recommendations (1) performed continual surveillance of literature to update the living systematic review with new evidence and (2) updated the Evidence Summary tables and draft recommendations for panel discussion. The Steering Committee reviews the updated evidence summary and determines if the update will be presented to the Consensus Panel again. If so, the Consensus Panel is convened in an online meeting to discuss the new evidence and any changes in the living recommendation.

The Living CPG Development Process is summarized in the figure below:

As a living guideline, the recommendations will be updated, and new recommendations will be added as the evidence evolves. The living recommendations are based on the best evidence available in scientific literature at the time of its formulation. However, this living CPG is not a comprehensive guide to all practice questions and management options on COVID-19. This is not meant to restrict the practitioner in using sound clinical judgement and sharing the decision with the patient, and from considering other management options according to the patient’s particular needs and preferences. This CPG can serve to inform policy, but it is not meant to serve as a basis for approving or denying financial coverage or insurance claims merely because of nonconformance with recommendations. Neither are the recommendations supposed to be considered as legal rules for dictating certain modes of action to the exclusion of others.