Editing Medical consensus (section)

==Methods==
There are many ways of producing medical consensus, but the most usual way is to convene an independent panel of experts, either by a [[medical association]] or by a governmental authority.

Since consensus statements provide a "snapshot in time" of the state of knowledge in a particular topic, they must periodically be re-evaluated and published again, replacing the previous consensus statement.

Consensus statements differ from [[Guideline (medical)|medical guideline]]s, another form of state-of-the-science public statements. According to the NIH, "Consensus statements synthesize new information, largely from recent or ongoing [[medical research]], that has implications for reevaluation of routine medical practices. They do not give specific [[algorithm]]s or guidelines for practice."<ref>{{cite web |url=http://aspe.hhs.gov/infoquality/guidelines/NIHinfo2.shtml |title=Guidelines for Ensuring the Quality of Information Disseminated to the Public |date=13 December 2006 |publisher=United States Department of Health and Human Services |accessdate=18 August 2013}}</ref>