What do clinical practice guidelines say about deprescribing? A scoping review

Introduction: Deprescribing (medication dose reduction or cessation) is an integral component of appropriate prescribing. The extent to which deprescribing recommendations are included in clinical practice guidelines is unclear. This scoping review aimed to identify guidelines that contain deprescribing recommendations, qualitatively explore the content and format of deprescribing recommendations and estimate the proportion of guidelines that contain deprescribing recommendations.

Methods: Bibliographic databases and Google were searched for guidelines published in English from January 2012 to November 2022. Guideline registries were searched from January 2017 to February 2023. Two reviewers independently screened records from databases and Google for guidelines containing one or more deprescribing recommendations. A 10% sample of the guideline registries was screened to identify eligible guidelines and estimate the proportion of guidelines containing a deprescribing recommendation. Guideline and recommendation characteristics were extracted and language features of deprescribing recommendations including content, form, complexity and readability were examined using a conventional content analysis and the SHeLL Health Literacy Editor tool.

Results: 80 guidelines containing 316 deprescribing recommendations were included. Deprescribing recommendations had substantial variability in their format and terminology. Most guidelines contained recommendations regarding for who (75%, n=60), what (99%, n=89) and when or why (91%, n=73) to deprescribe, however, fewer guidelines (58%, n=46) contained detailed guidance on how to deprescribe. Approximately 29% of guidelines identified from the registries sample (n=14/49) contained one or more deprescribing recommendations.

Conclusions: Deprescribing recommendations are increasingly being incorporated into guidelines, however, many guidelines do not contain clear and actionable recommendations on how to deprescribe which may limit effective implementation in clinical practice. A co-designed template or best practice guide, containing information on aspects of deprescribing recommendations that are essential or preferred by end-users should be developed and employed.

Trial registration number: osf.io/fbex4.