European Stroke Organisation (ESO) standard operating procedure for white papers (expert consensus based clinical guidance)

TY - JOUR

T1 - European Stroke Organisation (ESO) standard operating procedure for white papers (expert consensus based clinical guidance)

AU - Aguiar de Sousa, Diana

AU - Zietz, Annaelle

AU - Zedde, Marialuisa

AU - Katsanos, Aristeidis H.

AU - Li, Linxin

AU - Marti-Fabregas, Joan

AU - Nolte, Christian H.

AU - Podlasek, Anna

AU - Poli, Sven

AU - Purrucker, Jan

AU - Roaldsen, Melinda B.

AU - Schellinger, Peter D.

AU - Strbian, Daniel

AU - Tsivgoulis, Georgios

AU - Tsokani, Sofia

AU - Veroniki, Areti Angeliki

AU - Quinn, Terence J.

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © European Stroke Organisation 2025.

PY - 2025/9

Y1 - 2025/9

N2 - Promoting the highest quality, evidence-based research across Europe is a priority of the European Stroke Organisation (ESO). The ESO Guideline Board communicate and promote evidence-based recommendations for clinical practice through their Guidelines. However, there are many aspects of stroke care where robust scientific evidence may be unavailable or difficult to obtain. Thus, there is a need for practical, consensus guidance, produced following robust, consistent, and transparent methods, that is suitable for high-priority clinical scenarios where evidence is currently lacking. The ESO Guideline Board developed methods for producing practical clinical guidance based on expert consensus in response to this need. These ESO’ White Papers’ are intended to complement standard ESO Guidelines. Here, we outline the ESO White Papers’ standard operating procedure (SOP). We will describe the motivation for creating White Papers, the preferred composition of writing groups and expert consensus panellists, the methods for achieving consensus, and how results will be communicated. To ensure that all voting members have an equal voice, our methods are based upon the Delphi process of repeated rounds of anonymous voting, feedback and review. We hope that the White Papers will add further value to the clinical practice guidance that is offered by ESO. We look forward to receiving suggestions for White Paper topics from the stroke community.

AB - Promoting the highest quality, evidence-based research across Europe is a priority of the European Stroke Organisation (ESO). The ESO Guideline Board communicate and promote evidence-based recommendations for clinical practice through their Guidelines. However, there are many aspects of stroke care where robust scientific evidence may be unavailable or difficult to obtain. Thus, there is a need for practical, consensus guidance, produced following robust, consistent, and transparent methods, that is suitable for high-priority clinical scenarios where evidence is currently lacking. The ESO Guideline Board developed methods for producing practical clinical guidance based on expert consensus in response to this need. These ESO’ White Papers’ are intended to complement standard ESO Guidelines. Here, we outline the ESO White Papers’ standard operating procedure (SOP). We will describe the motivation for creating White Papers, the preferred composition of writing groups and expert consensus panellists, the methods for achieving consensus, and how results will be communicated. To ensure that all voting members have an equal voice, our methods are based upon the Delphi process of repeated rounds of anonymous voting, feedback and review. We hope that the White Papers will add further value to the clinical practice guidance that is offered by ESO. We look forward to receiving suggestions for White Paper topics from the stroke community.

KW - Consensus

KW - Delphi

KW - evidence

KW - guideline

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105008207714

U2 - 10.1177/23969873251316430

DO - 10.1177/23969873251316430

M3 - Article

C2 - 39904756

AN - SCOPUS:105008207714

SN - 2396-9873

VL - 10

SP - 637

EP - 645

JO - European Stroke Journal

JF - European Stroke Journal

IS - 3

ER -