Therefore,physicians should produce and publish more kinds of evidence-based case reports to direct evidence-based clinical practice.

Nowadays, there have been many clinical practice guidelines that developed in relevant medical websites and medical databases, and the quality of the guidelines varies.

An Evidence-Based Approach to Clinical Practice Guidelines;

Developing and disseminating high quality clinical practice guideline is an effective method to improve the outcomes of patients and reduce the medical cost.

This assay introduces the origin,basic concept of clinical pathway,the current status of the development of clinical pathway,the basic principle and method of developing clinical pathway,and the common and different aspects between clinical pathway and clinical practice guideline,as well as the possible application of clinical pathway into Chinese medicine.

This review is to systematically summarize other countries methodology for developing scientifically sound guidelines,in order to share information and gain experience in developing the evidence based guidelines suited to the clinical situation in China.