Practice guidelines. Cookbook medicine

A large measure of the confusion and doubt currently being sowed in the ongoing debate over the advisability and effectiveness of practice guidelines is a matter of terminology. In deference to the wishes and fears of physicians, the term "requirements" is not used. But requirements they are. Their quality and the degree to which they are useful will depend on their level of detail and the degree to which they are based on positive outcomes. Regardless, attorneys and others will always view and use them as requirements.