European Association of Urology Pocket Guidelines 2018

We are pleased to present the 2018 edition of the European Association of Urology (EAU) Guidelines. The EAU Guidelines are the most comprehensive, continuously updated, guidelines available for urologists and related specialties. Produced by a dedicated Guidelines Office, involving approximately 300 international experts drawn from across Europe and beyond, the EAU Guidelines are internationally recognised as an excellent, high-quality, resource for assisting clinicians in their everyday practice. Clinical guidelines are a highly influential tool for improving clinical care, unifying healthcare provision and managing healthcare-associated resources across Europe and beyond. Consequently, they must be transparent, free of bias, give a balanced account of risks and benefits and take into consideration patient preferences. To this end, the 2018 guidelines sees the implementation of a new system for grading guidelines recommendations based upon a modified GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) approach. Consequently, each and every recommendation contained within the guidelines, along with the evidence underpinning it, has been reassessed and a Strength Rating Form produced (posted online at: www.uroweb.org/guidelines). Recommendations now take into account the available evidence, the strength and overall quality of that evidence, the balance between desirable and undesirable consequences of any given recommendation compared with alternative interventions, whilst also taking into account patients’ values and preferences. A further change can also be found in the way in which the strength of 2 Introduction each recommendation is represented. Recommendations are no longer denoted by alphabetic characters, but rather by the words ‘strong’ or ‘weak’, with each panel providing both ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ recommendations ‘for’ or ‘against’ a specific intervention. We hope that you find the new format useful and that they provide helpful, clear and unambiguous guidance. Going forward, a key a