The CTFPHC Newsletter Issue 1

De­vel­op­ing and dis­sem­i­nat­ing clin­i­cal prac­tice guide­lines for pri­mary and pre­ven­tive care, based on sys­tem­atic analy­sis of sci­en­tific ev­i­dence.

The Task Force is com­prised of 15 in­de­pen­dent pri­mary care ex­perts who lead the de­vel­op­ment of rec­om­men­da­tions for clin­i­cal pre­ven­tive ser­vices in Canada. An Ev­i­dence Re­view and Syn­the­sis Cen­tre, based at Mc­Mas­ter Uni­ver­sity and co-funded col­lab­o­ra­tively by CIHR and PHAC, de­vel­ops sys­tem­atic ev­i­dence re­views to in­form prac­tice guide­lines and rec­om­men­da­tions.

Wel­come mes­sage from the chair

Greet­ings! I am pleased to wel­come back the Cana­dian Task Force on Pre­ven­tive Health Care and its new mem­ber­ship.

Dur­ing my time so far as chair, I have de­vel­oped a deep ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the im­por­tant job ahead for the Task Force. With the ded­i­ca­tion of our Task Force mem­bers, the 2011 guide­lines are now well un­der­way fol­low­ing two meet­ings in April and June 2010, with an up­com­ing meet­ing in No­vem­ber 2010.

A key el­e­ment of our work is link­ing up with you, our key stake­hold­ers, to in­te­grate your voice and input into the guide­lines we de­velop. You’ll hear from us in var­i­ous ways: in­volv­ing you in topic iden­ti­fi­ca­tion, re­ceiv­ing your feed­back on draft guide­lines and part­ner­ing on dis­sem­i­na­tion.

At the Fam­ily Med­i­cine Forum (FMF), tak­ing place in Van­cou­ver from Oc­to­ber 14–16, the Task Force will be col­lect­ing input from fam­ily doc­tors about guide­line top­ics they would like to see the Task Force pro­duce, as well as their pref­er­ences for re­ceiv­ing guide­lines in a form that will make them most use­ful to their prac­tice.

It is my hope that this newslet­ter will reach out to those who share our vi­sion for bet­ter pre­ven­tive health care and will keep read­ers up-to-date on the work of the Task Force. Please link up with us any­time through the Task Force Of­fice at (613) 960‒8841 or on­line at canadiantaskforce.​ca.

Sin­cerely,
Mar­cello Tonelli, MD SM
Chair, CTFPHC

We’re back!

The Cana­dian Task Force on Pre­ven­tive Health Care (Task Force) is pleased to pre­sent its first e-newslet­ter, keep­ing part­ners and col­leagues up-to-date on the work of the Task Force.

As part of its man­date for dis­ease pre­ven­tion and health pro­mo­tion, the Pub­lic Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) re-es­tab­lished the new Task Force in 2010, build­ing on the pre­vi­ous Task Force’s 25 year his­tory of pro­vid­ing ‘gold stan­dard’ ev­i­dence-in­formed rec­om­men­da­tions for clin­i­cal pre­ven­tion. The new Task Force is sup­ported by a ded­i­cated of­fice at PHAC, and an Ev­i­dence Re­view and Syn­the­sis Cen­tre based at Mc­Mas­ter Uni­ver­sity.

“Putting pre­ven­tion into prac­tice” is a key fac­tor in main­tain­ing good health. The Task Force is com­mit­ted to de­liv­er­ing high qual­ity ev­i­dence in­formed clin­i­cal prac­tice guide­lines to their tar­get au­di­ence and de­vel­op­ing tools for their ef­fec­tive im­ple­men­ta­tion in prac­tice.

The Task Force met for the first time April 26–27 and got right down to busi­ness for a full two days, with the ob­jec­tive of iden­ti­fy­ing top­ics and de­vis­ing a frame­work for pri­or­i­tiz­ing guide­lines for 2010–2013.

Topic work­ing groups were es­tab­lished in knowl­edge trans­fer, meth­ods de­vel­op­ment, and topic pri­or­i­ti­za­tion. Guide­line work­ing groups were also struck for di­a­betes, breast can­cer, hy­per­ten­sion, de­pres­sion, and cer­vi­cal can­cer.

The sec­ond TF meet­ing took place on June 28, when the Task Force com­piled top­ics from the pub­lic and part­ners and un­der­took a rank­ing to come up with top­ics for the next three years. Those top­ics are:

• Screen­ing for breast can­cer
• Screen­ing for hy­per­ten­sion
• Screen­ing for de­pres­sion
• Screen­ing for di­a­betes
• Screen­ing for cer­vi­cal can­cer
• Screen­ing for obe­sity
• Screen­ing for mod­er­ately el­e­vated mul­ti­ple car­dio­vas­cu­lar and meta­bolic risk fac­tors
• Screen­ing for col­orec­tal can­cer
• Screen­ing for prostate can­cer
• Screen­ing and pre­ven­tion of os­teo­poro­sis in men and women
• Pre­ven­tion of to­bacco-caused dis­ease
• Screen­ing for de­vel­op­men­tal prob­lems/dis­or­ders in preschool
• Early de­tec­tion and coun­sel­ing for prob­lem drink­ing
• Screen­ing for cog­ni­tive im­pair­ment & de­men­tia in the el­derly

The Task Force al­ways wel­comes sug­ges­tions for top­ics!

Please visit our web­site under ‘Contact’ or e-mail us at: info@​canadiantaskforce.​ca to pro­vide us with your feed­back on our topic list or sug­gest a topic.

Part­ners group

The first Task Force meet­ing high­lighted the im­por­tant role that pri­mary care and pub­lic health part­ners play in ad­vanc­ing pre­ven­tion across Canada. In order to en­sure the work of the Task Force is linked strongly to key part­ners in guide­line de­vel­op­ment, dis­sem­i­na­tion, and up­take in prac­tice, a part­ners group has been es­tab­lished. PHAC serves as the focal point for part­ner in­te­gra­tion into the work of the Task Force. For more in­for­ma­tion on the part­ners group, con­tact Cather­ine Makris at (613) 948‒4085 or catherine.​makris@​phac-aspc.​gc.​ca.

For more in­for­ma­tion re­gard­ing up­com­ing meet­ings, check back on our web­site or sign up with the Task Force’s mail­ing list.