The role of Cochrane reviews in informing international guidelines: a case study of using the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation system to develop World Health Organization guidelines for the psychosocially assisted pharmacological treatment of opioid dependence

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The World Health Organization (WHO), and a growing number of other organizations, have adopted the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) system in order to both assess the quality of research evidence and develop clinical practice guidelines. In 2009 WHO published a guideline on psychosocially assisted pharmacological treatment of opioid dependence, based on the results of Cochrane …