Reply to "Review of living kidney donor guidelines is out of date before publication"

We commend The British Transplantation Society and The Renal Association for their recent publication, “United Kingdom Guidelines for Living Donor Kidney Transplantation (Third Edition).” Indeed, this update is more comprehensive and involves a systematic search and appraisal of the literature. Their recommendations have now been graded according to the international GRADE system, which makes explicit the quality of the evidence and strength of the recommendations. A revised Guideline Development Policy was also released by the Society on September 4, 2011, for public comment, which describes the policies and processes for guideline selection, development, and dissemination.
We agree that our systematic review of clinical practice guidelines on screening and follow-up of living kidney donors did not include the Third Edition of the United Kingdom Guidelines for Living Donor Kidney Transplantation. As reported in our review, our search was conducted to week 2 February 2011. In addition, all analysis and external peer refereeing of our paper were completed before the release of the final, postreview version of the United Kingdom Guidelines for Living Donor Kidney Transplantation (Third Edition).