This guideline covers care for adults and young people (aged 10 years and older) with physical health problems that are completely or partly caused by an alcohol-use disorder. It aims to improve the health of people with alcohol-use disorders by providing recommendations on managing acute alcohol withdrawal and treating alcohol-related conditions.
This guideline covers endoscopy treatments for people aged 18 and over with Barrett’s oesophagus and high-grade dysplasia or intramucosal cancer. It offers advice on which types of endoscopy treatments should be offered and how these should be used. It aims to improve choice of treatment for adults with Barrett’s oesophagus and improve quality of life and survival for those who cannot have surgery.
This guideline covers assessment, diagnosis and referral for people over 16 who have had a transient loss of consciousness (TLoC; also called a blackout). It aims to improve care for people with TLoC by specifying the most effective assessments and recommending when to refer to a specialist.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) which is also known as myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) (or encephalopathy). It aims to improve the quality of life for people with CFS/ME by setting out the care and treatment options that should be available for them.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing atopic eczema in children under 12. It aims to improve care for children with atopic eczema by making detailed recommendations on treatment and specialist referral. The guideline also explains how healthcare professionals should assess the effect eczema has on quality of life, in addition to its physical severity.
This guideline covers surgical treatment of children younger than 12 years who have fluid buildup behind their eardrum (otitis media, also known as ‘glue ear’). It aims to improve hearing and quality of life in children with otitis media.
This guideline covers medicines adherence in people aged 18 and over. It recommends how to encourage adherence to medicines by supporting and involving people in decisions about their prescribed medicines. It aims to ensure that a person’s decision to use a medicine is an informed choice.
This guideline covers principles for working with people with antisocial personality disorder, including dealing with crises (crisis resolution). It aims to help people with antisocial personality disorder manage feelings of anger, distress, anxiety and depression, and to reduce offending and antisocial behaviour.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing gastro-oesophageal reflux disease in children and young people (under 18s). It aims to raise awareness of symptoms that need investigating and treating, and to reassure parents and carers that regurgitation is common in infants under 1 year.
This guideline covers care for people aged 18 and over with common mental health problems, with a focus on primary care. It aims to improve access to services for adults and how mental health problems are identified and assessed, and makes recommendations on local care pathways.
This guideline covers managing hip fracture in adults. It aims to improve care from the time people aged 18 and over are admitted to hospital through to when they return to the community. Recommendations emphasise the importance of early surgery and coordinating care through a multidisciplinary hip fracture programme to help people recover faster and regain their mobility.
This guideline covers managing stable angina in people aged 18 and over. It outlines the importance of addressing the person’s concerns about stable angina and the roles of medical therapy and revascularisation.
This guideline covers recognising and diagnosing autism spectrum disorder in children and young people from birth up to 19 years. It also covers referral. It aims to improve the experience of children, young people and those who care for them.
This guideline covers managing spasticity and co-existing motor disorders and their early musculoskeletal complications in children and young people (from birth up to their 19th birthday) with non-progressive brain disorders. It aims to reduce variation in practice and help healthcare professionals to select and use appropriate treatments.
This guideline covers assessing the risk of fragility fracture in people aged 18 and over with osteoporosis. It aims to provide guidance on the selection and use of risk assessment tools in the care of adults at risk of fragility fractures in all NHS settings.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing peripheral arterial disease (PAD) in people aged 18 and over. Rapid changes in diagnostic methods, endovascular treatments and vascular services associated with new specialties in surgery and interventional radiology have resulted in considerable uncertainty and variation in practice. This guideline aims to resolve that uncertainty and variation.
This guideline covers assessing and managing urinary incontinence in children, young people and adults with neurological disease. It aims to improve care by recommending specific treatments based on what symptoms and neurological conditions people have.
This guideline covers preventing and controlling healthcare-associated infections in children, young people and adults in primary and community care settings. It provides a blueprint for the infection prevention and control precautions that should be applied by everyone involved in delivering NHS care and treatment.
This guideline covers safe and effective prescribing of strong opioids for pain relief in adults with advanced and progressive disease. It aims to clarify the clinical pathway for prescribing and help to improve pain management and patient safety. Care during the last 2 to 3 days of life is covered by care of dying adults in the last days of life.
This guideline covers how upper gastrointestinal bleeding can be effectively managed in adults and young people aged 16 years and older. It aims to identify which diagnostic and therapeutic steps are useful so hospitals can develop a structure in which clinical teams can deliver an optimum service for people who develop this condition.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing suspected or confirmed autism spectrum disorder (autism, Asperger’s syndrome and atypical autism) in people aged 18 and over. It aims to improve access and engagement with interventions and services, and the experience of care, for people with autism.
This guideline covers managing acute painful sickle cell episodes in children, young people and adults who present at hospital, from presentation until when they are discharged. It aims to reduce variation in how acute episodes are managed in hospital, focusing on effective, prompt and safe pain relief.
This guideline covers the diagnosis and management of venous thromboembolic diseases in adults (aged 18 and over), and the role of thrombophilia testing. It aims to clarify which diagnostic tests should be used, reduce variation in pharmacological therapies, and provide guidance on when thrombophilia testing is useful.
This guideline covers the longer-term psychological treatment and management of self-harm in people aged 8 and over. It aims to improve the quality of care and support for people who self harm and covers both single and recurrent episodes of self-harm.
This guideline covers assessment and referral for anaphylaxis. It aims to improve the quality of care for people with suspected anaphylaxis by detailing the assessments that are needed and recommending referral to specialist allergy services.
This guideline covers identifying people who wish to donate their organs after their death. It offers advice on how to approach families and carers of people who are nearing the end of life and how to seek consent for organ donation. It aims to promote discussion of organ donation as part of end-of-life care and to increase the number of organs available for people waiting for a transplant.
This guideline covers preventing infection within 72 hours of birth in healthy babies, treating pregnant women whose baby is at risk, and caring for babies who have a suspected or confirmed infection. It aims to reduce delays in recognising and treating sick babies and prevent unnecessary use of antibiotics.
This guideline covers advice on the diagnosis and management of tension-type headache, migraine (including migraine with aura and menstrual-related migraine), cluster headache and medication overuse headache in young people (aged 12 years and older) and adults. It aims to improve the recognition and management of headaches, with more targeted treatment to improve the quality of life for people with headaches, and to reduce unnecessary investigations.
This guideline covers preventing, identifying and managing neutropenic sepsis in children, young people and adults receiving treatment for cancer in the community and in secondary and tertiary care. It aims to reduce the risk of infection in people with neutropenia (low number of white blood cells) who are receiving anticancer treatment and improve management of neutropenic sepsis.
This guideline covers assessing and managing people aged 14 years and over with coexisting severe mental illness (psychosis) and substance misuse. It aims to help healthcare professionals guide people with psychosis with coexisting substance misuse to stabilise, reduce or stop their substance misuse, to improve treatment adherence and outcomes, and to enhance their lives.
This guideline covers detecting, diagnosing and treating women (18 years and older) who have, or are suspected of having, epithelial ovarian cancer, fallopian tube cancer, primary peritoneal cancer or borderline ovarian cancer. It aims to enable earlier detection of ovarian cancer and improve initial treatment.
This guideline covers managing hyperglycaemia in the first 48 hours for adults admitted to hospital for acute coronary syndromes. It aims to improve initial management of hyperglycaemia and ensure that adults are given advice on their diabetes risk and how to reduce it.
This guideline covers the diagnosis and management of prostate cancer in secondary care, including information on the best way to diagnose and identify different stages of the disease, and how to manage adverse effects of treatment. It also includes recommendations on follow-up in primary care for people diagnosed with prostate cancer.
This guideline covers diagnosing and managing ectopic pregnancy and miscarriage in women with complications, such as pain and bleeding, in early pregnancy (that is, up to 13 completed weeks of pregnancy). It aims to improve how early pregnancy loss is diagnosed, and the support women are given, to limit the psychological impact of their loss.
This guideline covers the assessment and management of melanoma (a type of skin cancer) in children, young people and adults. It aims to reduce variation in practice and improve survival.
This guideline covers the organisation and provision of major trauma services in pre-hospital and hospital settings, including ambulance services, emergency departments, major trauma centres and trauma units. It aims to reduce deaths and disabilities in people with serious injuries by providing a systematic approach to the delivery of major trauma care. It does not cover services for people with burns.
This guideline covers the assessment and early management of spinal column and spinal cord injury in pre-hospital settings (including ambulance services), emergency departments and major trauma centres. It covers traumatic injuries to the spine but does not cover spinal injury caused by a disease.It aims to reduce death and disability by improving the quality of emergency and urgent care.
This guideline covers general principles for managing intravenous (IV) fluids for children and young people under 16 years, including assessing fluid and electrolyte status and prescribing IV fluid therapy. It applies to a range of conditions and different settings. It does not include recommendations relating to specific conditions. This guideline represents a major opportunity to improve patient safety for children and young people having IV fluid therapy in hospital.
This guideline covers managing diabetes and its complications in women who are planning pregnancy or are already pregnant. It aims to improve the diagnosis of gestational diabetes and help women with diabetes to self-manage their blood glucose levels before and during pregnancy.
This guideline covers the diagnosing and managing of myeloma (including smouldering myeloma and primary plasma cell leukaemia) in people aged 16 and over. It aims to improve care for people with myeloma by promoting the most effective tests and treatments for myeloma and its complications.
This guideline covers assessing and managing cancers of the upper aerodigestive tract in people aged 16 and over. These are cancers of the airways of the head and neck, including the mouth, throat, larynx (voicebox) and sinuses. It aims to reduce variation in practice and improve survival.
This guideline covers assessing and managing pelvic fractures, open fractures and severe ankle fractures (known as pilon fractures and intra-articular distal tibia fractures) in pre-hospital settings (including ambulance services), emergency departments and major trauma centres. It aims to reduce deaths and long-term health problems by improving the quality of emergency and urgent care.
This guideline covers assessing and managing non-complex fractures that can be treated in the emergency department or orthopaedic clinic. It aims to improve practice so that people with fractures receive the care that they need without unnecessary tests and treatments.
This guideline covers the care of healthy women and their babies, during labour and immediately after the birth. It focuses on women who give birth between 37 and 42 weeks of pregnancy (‘term’). The guideline helps women to make an informed choice about where to have their baby. It also aims to reduce variation in areas of care such as fetal monitoring during labour and management of the third stage of labour.
This guideline covers recognising and managing borderline personality disorder. It aims to help people with borderline personality disorder to manage feelings of distress, anxiety, worthlessness and anger, and to maintain stable and close relationships with others.
This guideline covers care and support for people with advanced (stage 4) breast cancer. It aims to help them and their healthcare professionals make shared decisions about tests and treatments to improve outcomes and quality of life.
This guideline covers how patients in hospital should be monitored to identify those whose health may become worse suddenly and the care they should receive. It aims to reduce the risk of patients needing to stay longer in hospital, not recovering fully or dying. It doesn’t specifically cover the care of children, patients in critical care areas or those in the final stages of a terminal illness.
This guideline covers using psychosocial interventions to treat adults and young people over 16 who have a problem with or are dependent on opioids, stimulants or cannabis. It aims to reduce illicit drug use and improve people’s physical and mental health, relationships and employment.
This guideline covers detecting and managing metastatic spinal cord compression in adults with cancer that has spread to the spine. It aims to improve quality of life by promoting early detection and management, and reducing spinal cord damage and disability.
This guideline covers identifying and managing familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH), a specific type of high cholesterol that runs in the family, in children, young people and adults. It aims to help identify people at increased risk of coronary heart disease as a result of having FH.