The Alberta Health Technology Assessment (HTA) Ambassador Program: The Development of a Contextually Relevant, Multidisciplinary Clinical Practice Guideline for Non-specific Low Back Pain: A Review

Abstract

Purpose: To describe the development of a contextually relevant multidisciplinary clinical practice guideline (CPG) for non-specific low back pain (LBP) and to discuss its value to the management of LBP and the practice of physiotherapy. Method: To mitigate an identified knowledge gap for Alberta primary-care practitioners in the management of non-specific LBP, a collaborative process was developed to engage multidisciplinary health care providers in designing a primary-care CPG for non-specific LBP. A comprehensive review of published LBP guidelines identified the seven highest-quality CPGs; these were used to inform a multidisciplinary guideline development group (GDG) as they developed the CPG. Results: The GDG constructed a CPG for non-specific LBP along with point-of-care decision-support and patient-education tools. Conclusions: The Ambassador Program on Low Back Pain worked with front-line clinicians from across Alberta to review the best available evidence in developing a CPG responsive to the Alberta context. This CPG is intervention specific and provides a wide range of primary-care practitioners with the best available evidence to inform their clinical decisions in managing non-specific LBP.