Table 1.

Characteristics of guidelines and developers

	Total guidelines (n = 1360)		1994–1999 guidelines (n = 730)		2000–2005 guidelines (n = 630)
	N	%	n	%	n	%
Type of organization
National professional (e.g. Canadian Medical Association)	450	33.1	254	34.8	196	31.1
Para-government (e.g. Cancer Care Ontario)	313	23.0	177	24.2	136	21.6
Licensing (e.g. College of Physicians and Surgeons of Manitoba)	180	13.2	116	15.9	64	10.2
Government (e.g. Canadian Task Force on the Periodic Health Exam)	243	17.9	113	15.5	130	20.6
Provincial medical (e.g. Alberta Medical Association)	62	4.6	29	4.0	33	5.2
National health association (e.g. Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada)	88	6.5	24	3.3	64	10.2
Provincial health association (e.g. Ontario Association of Medical Laboratories	24	1.8	17	2.3	7	1.1
Language
English only	1032	75.9	424	58.1	608	96.5
French only	24	1.8	24	3.3	0	0
Bilingual	304	22.4	282	38.6	22	3.5
Date of publication
1994	183	13.5
1995	109	8.0
1996	122	9.0
1997	114	8.4
1998	129	9.5
1999	73	5.4
2000	113	8.3
2001	130	9.6
2002	124	9.1
2003	123	9.0
2004	90	6.6
2005	50	3.7