Executive Summary
Executive Summary
This clinical practice guideline is a systematic synthesis of evidence to address clinical
questions on animal bites—rabies, snakebites, marine animal bites. It provides seventeen
(17) recommendations on ten (10) prioritized questions.
Recommendations are based on the appraisal of the best available evidence on each of the
identified clinical questions. The CPG is intended to be used by general practitioners, doctors
in the primary care setting, specialists, allied health professionals, healthcare delivery
institutions, and policy makers.
The guideline development process followed the widely accepted Grading of
Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation or the GRADE approach
including GRADE Adolopment1
, a systematic process of adapting evidence summaries, and
the GRADE Evidence to Decision or EtD2
framework. It included: (1) identification of critical
questions and critical outcomes, (2) retrieval of current evidence, (3) assessment and
synthesis of the evidence base for the critical questions, (4) formulation of draft
recommendations, (5) convening of a multi-sectoral stakeholder panel to discuss values and
preferences and assess the strength of the recommendations, and (6) planning for
dissemination, implementation, impact evaluation and updating.
The recommendations in this CPG shall hold and will be updated after five years or when new
evidence arises.
