Clinical guidelines
Find out about clinical guidelines
The RCN has supported the development of clinical guidelines. For further information about the range of guidelines visit clinical guidelines.
The main national bodies for clinical guidelines across the UK are:
References to national guidelines on specific aspects of diabetes care appear throughout this resource. If you would like to find out more about the development and use of clinical guidelines, there is a learning area on understanding, finding, appraising and implementing clinical guidelines on the RCN Learning Zone (available to RCN members). When you enter the Learning Zone you will find a link to this learning opportunity in the clinical skills area.
National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) website
NICE produces three types of guidance for England and Wales: public health guidance, health technologies guidance and clinical practice guidance. Go to the NICE website.
NICE has published a simple guide on their website which explains how decisions about guidance are reached and how topics are referred to NICE. NICE has organised guidance by topic. View the diabetes topic homepage on the NICE website.
The RCN is a consultee/stakeholder for the NICE guidance development process. As part of this process the RCN is invited to participate in the development and review of draft guidance for implementation in the NHS. For more information visit NICE consultation gateway.
NICE pathways and quality standards
NICE pathways is an online tool for health and social care professionals that brings together all related NICE guidance and associated products in a set of interactive topic-based diagrams. The pathways visually represent everything NICE has said on a particular topic, enabling you to see at a glance all of NICE's recommendations on a specific clinical or health topic. View the diabetes pathway.
NICE quality standards are a set of specific, concise statements that act as markers of high-quality, cost-effective patient care, covering the treatment and prevention of different diseases and conditions. They are developed independently by NICE, in collaboration with the NHS and social care professionals, their partners and service users, and address three dimensions of quality: clinical effectiveness, patient safety and patient experience. Visit the diabetes in adults quality standard.
The following links will guide you to different parts of the NICE website where you can find more about how NICE guidelines are developed:
Technology appraisals
Guidelines and cancer service guidance
- About clinical guidelines
- National collaborating centres
- Guidelines in development
- Published guidelines
- Research and development
- Patient and public involvement
- Putting guidance into practice
- Implementation tools
- Subscribe to newsletter and alerts.
Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) website
SIGN produces evidence-based clinical guidelines to improve the quality of health care for patients in Scotland. Go to the SIGN website.
The following links will guide you to different parts of the SIGN website where you can find more about how SIGN guidelines are developed:
- What is SIGN?
- Guideline development process
- Suggest a guideline topic
- Current work programme
- Guidelines by topic
- Patient involvement
- The AGREE guideline appraisal instrument
- SIGN patient network.
Guidelines and Audit Implementation Network (GAIN) website
Northern Ireland's Clinical Resources Efficiency Support Team (CREST) amalgamated with the Regional Multiprofessional Audit Group (RMAG) and the Northern Ireland Audit Advisory Committee (NIRAAC) to form a single clinical and social care regional audit and guidelines body for Northern Ireland. This new entity is known as the Guidelines and Audit Implementation Network (GAIN).
GAIN has a safety and quality improvement role in Northern Ireland's Health and Social Care Services through the commissioning of regional audit and guidelines, the promotion of good practice, and the publication and facilitation of guideline implementation. Go to the GAIN website.