Dataset Information

Collaborative and partnership research for improvement of health and social services: researcher's experiences from 20 projects.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Getting research into policy and practice in healthcare is a recognised, world-wide concern. As an attempt to bridge the gap between research and practice, research funders are requesting more interdisciplinary and collaborative research, while actual experiences of such processes have been less studied. Accordingly, the purpose of this study was to gain more knowledge on the interdisciplinary, collaborative and partnership research process by investigating researchers' experiences of and approaches to the process, based on their participation in an inventive national research programme. The programme aimed to boost collaborative and partnership research and build learning structures, while improving ways to lead, manage and develop practices in Swedish health and social services.

Methods

Interviews conducted with project leaders and/or lead researchers and documentation from 20 projects were analysed using directed and conventional content analysis.

Results

Collaborative approaches were achieved by design, e.g. action research, or by involving practitioners from several levels of the healthcare system in various parts of the research process. The use of dual roles as researcher/clinician or practitioner/PhD student or the use of education designed especially for practitioners or 'student researchers' were other approaches. The collaborative process constituted the area for the main lessons learned as well as the main problems. Difficulties concerned handling complexity and conflicts between different expectations and demands in the practitioner's and researcher's contexts, and dealing with human resource issues and group interactions when forming collaborative and interdisciplinary research teams. The handling of such challenges required time, resources, knowledge, interactive learning and skilled project management.

Conclusions

Collaborative approaches are important in the study of complex phenomena. Results from this study show that allocated time, arenas for interactions and skills in project management and communication are needed during research collaboration to ensure support and build trust and understanding with involved practitioners at several levels in the healthcare system. For researchers, dealing with this complexity takes time and energy from the scientific process. For practitioners, this puts demands on understanding a research process and how it fits with on-going organisational agendas and activities and allocating time. Some of the identified factors may be overlooked by funders and involved stakeholders when designing, performing and evaluating interdisciplinary, collaborative and partnership research.

SUBMITTER: Nystrom ME

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5975592 | biostudies-literature | 2018 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Collaborative and partnership research for improvement of health and social services: researcher's experiences from 20 projects.

Nyström M E ME Karltun J J Keller C C Andersson Gäre B B

Health research policy and systems 20180530 1

<h4>Background</h4>Getting research into policy and practice in healthcare is a recognised, world-wide concern. As an attempt to bridge the gap between research and practice, research funders are requesting more interdisciplinary and collaborative research, while actual experiences of such processes have been less studied. Accordingly, the purpose of this study was to gain more knowledge on the interdisciplinary, collaborative and partnership research process by investigating researchers' experi ...[more]

PMID: 29843735

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Project description:BackgroundActive engagement in research by healthcare organisations and clinicians is associated with improvements in healthcare performance. Barriers to research engagement by clinician allied health (AH) professionals include competing priorities from high clinical workloads, lack of research skills and confidence, and lack of supportive research relationships. Collaboration with universities on joint clinical research projects is well recognised as a means of building health service research capacity. Research projects undertaken by students as part of their qualifying degree represent one such opportunity. However, there are few reports evaluating these collaborations from the health service perspective.MethodsA qualitative study using semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis to explore the experiences of AH professionals in the co-supervision of students completing research placements as part of their professional degree course.ResultsFourteen health service employees from six allied health disciplines described collaborations on research projects with 24 students from four different universities. Student placements and projects varied widely in length of placement, extent of collaboration, supervision structure and study design. Three overarching themes were identified in the AH professional co-supervision experience: 1) Professional growth; 2) Mismatch with expectations; and 3) Focus on the student. Project outcomes were categorised from the health system perspective. These were 1) Healthcare performance improvements, including local increases in staff clinical practice knowledge and wider contributions to the evidence base; 2) Research capacity gains within the health service, including research knowledge and skill development, collaborative linkages and opportunity for future research; and 3) Staff-centred outcomes including increased job satisfaction.ConclusionsThis study demonstrates the potential for AH professional supervision of students on research placements to contribute to healthcare performance improvements and research capacity gains within health services, alongside providing personal benefits for the AH professionals involved. Early consultation with a health service-employed research specialist may support health professional and student learning, team collaboration and project coordination for these student projects.

Project description:Protecting human subjects from being exploited is one of the main ethical challenges for clinical research. However, there is also a responsibility to protect and respect the communities who are hosting the research. Recently, attention has focused on the most efficient way of carrying out clinical research, so that it benefits society by providing valuable research while simultaneously protecting and respecting the human subjects and the communities where the research is conducted. Collaboration between partners plays an important role and that is why we carried out a study to describe how collaborative partnership and social value are emerging in clinical research.A supra-analysis design for qualitative descriptive secondary analysis was employed to consider a novel research question that pertained to nurse leaders' perceptions of ethical recruitment in clinical research and the ethics-related aspects of clinical research from the perspective of administrative staff. The data consisted of two separate pre-existing datasets, comprising 451 pages from 41 interviews, and we considered the research question by using deductive-inductive content analysis with NVivo software. A deductive analysis matrix was generated on the basis of two requirements, namely collaborative partnership and social value, as presented in An Ethical Framework for Biomedical Research by Emanuel et al.The findings showed that collaborative partnership was a cornerstone for ethical clinical research and ways to foster inter-partner collaboration were indicated, such as supporting mutual respect and equality, shared goals and clearly defined roles and responsibilities. In addition, the social value of clinical research was an important precondition for ethical clinical research and its realisation required the research partners to demonstrate collaboration and shared responsibility during the research process. However, concerns emerged that the multidimensional meaning of clinical research for society was not fully recognised. Achieving greater social value for clinical research required greater transparency, setting research priorities, shared responsibility for the dissemination and use of the findings and stronger community awareness of the ethics-related aspects of clinical research.Collaborative partnership and social values are essential for protecting the human subjects and communities involved in clinical research.

Project description:Background: The Rare Disease Research Partnership (RAinDRoP) was established in 2018 to bring together a wide variety of diverse voices in the rare disease community in Ireland and form a research partnership. This approach enabled clinicians, patients, carers and researchers to work together to identify top research priorities for rare diseases, which focused on a life-course perspective rather than a disease-specific need. Methods: A participatory multiple phase approach was used to identify research priorities for rare diseases. The research process involved three main phases: Phase I, Public Consultation Survey on Research in Rare Diseases in Ireland (PCSRRDI); Phase II, Research Prioritisation Workshop (RPW); Phase III, Follow-up Public Consultation and Prioritisation Survey (FWPCPS). Results: In total, 240 individuals completed the phase I PCSRRDI, which comprised of a cross-section of health care professionals, researchers and people living with rare diseases. One thousand and fifteen statements were collected, reflecting issues and shared challenges in rare diseases. A shortlisting step by step was used to identify any statements that had received a total score of above 50% into 10-12 researchable questions or statements per the theme for the phase II workshop. Phase II was focused on three main themes: (1) Route to Diagnosis, (2) Living with Rare Disease, (3) Integrated and Palliative Care. In total, 62 individuals attended the overall workshop; 42 participated in the prioritisation sessions. A cross-section of health care professionals, researchers and people living with rare diseases were engaged at each workshop. Seventy-five individuals completed the final phase III public ranking by priority responses, and they ranked the top 15 research priorities defined by the multi-stakeholders at the phase II consensus meeting. Conclusions: This study identified priorities for rare diseases research aimed at improving the health and wellbeing of people living with rare diseases.

Project description:BACKGROUND:Quality Improvement (QI) approaches are increasingly used to bridge the quality gap in maternal and newborn care (MNC) in Sub Saharan Africa. Health workers typically serve as both recipients and implementers of QI activities; their understanding, motivation, and level of involvement largely determining the potential effect. In support of efforts to harmonise and integrate the various QI approaches implemented in parallel in Tanzanian health facilities, our objective was to investigate how different components of a collaborative QI intervention were understood and experienced by health workers, and therefore contributed positively to its mechanisms of effect. MATERIALS AND METHODS:A qualitative process evaluation of a collaborative QI intervention for MNC in rural Tanzania was carried out. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 health workers in 13 purposively sampled health facilities. A deductive theory-driven qualitative content analysis was employed using the integrated Promoting Action on Research Implementation in Health services (i-PARIHS) framework as a lens with its four constructs innovation, recipients, facilitation, and context as guiding themes. RESULTS:Health workers valued the high degree of fit between QI topics and their everyday practice and appreciated the intervention's comprehensive approach. The use of run-charts to monitor progress was well understood and experienced as motivating. The importance and positive experience of on-site mentoring and coaching visits to individual health facilities was expressed by the majority of health workers. Many described the parallel implementation of various health programs as a challenge. CONCLUSION:Components of QI approaches that are well understood and experienced as supportive by health workers in everyday practice may enhance mechanisms of effect and result in more significant change. A focus on such components may also guide harmonisation, to avoid duplication and the implementation of parallel programs, and country ownership of QI approaches in resource limited settings.

Project description:BackgroundIntegrated knowledge translation (IKT) can optimize the uptake of research evidence into clinical practice by incorporating knowledge users as equal partners in the entire research process. Although several studies have investigated stakeholder involvement in research, the literature on partnerships between researchers and clinicians in rehabilitation and their impact on clinical practice is scarce. This study described the individual research projects, the outcomes of these projects on clinical practice and the partnership experiences of an initiative that funds IKT projects co-led by a rehabilitation clinician and a researcher.MethodsThis was a sequential explanatory mixed methods study where quantitative data (document reviews and surveys) informed the qualitative phase (focus groups with researchers and interviews with clinicians). Descriptive analysis was completed for the quantitative data and thematic analysis was used for the qualitative data.Results53 projects were classified within multiple steps of the KTA framework. Descriptive information on the projects and outcomes were obtained through the survey for 37 of the 53 funded projects (70%). Half of the respondents (n = 18) were very satisfied or satisfied with their project's impact. Only two (6%) projects reported having measured sustainability of their projects and four (11%) measured long-term impact. A focus group with six researchers and individual interviews with nine clinicians highlighted the benefits (e.g. acquired collaborative skills, stronger networks between clinicians and academia) and challenges (e.g. measuring KT outcomes, lack of planning for sustainability, barriers related to clinician involvement in research) of participating in this initiative. Considerations when partnering on IKT projects included: the importance of having a supportive organization culture and physical proximity between collaborators, sharing motives for participating, leveraging everyone's expertise, grounding projects in KT models, discussing feasibility of projects on a restricted timeline, and incorporating the necessary knowledge users. Clinicians discussed the main outputs (scientific contribution, training and development, increased awareness of best practice, step in a larger effort) as project outcomes, but highlighted the complexity of measuring outcomes on clinical practice.ConclusionThe study provides a portrait of an IKT funding model, sheds light on past IKT projects' strengths and weaknesses and provides strategies for promoting positive partnership experiences between researchers and rehabilitation clinicians.

Project description:ObjectivesThe outcome of well-performed clinical research is essential for evidence-based patient management during pandemics. However, conducting clinical research amidst a pandemic requires researchers to balance clinical and research demands. We seek to understand the values, experiences, and beliefs of physicians working at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in order to inform clinical research planning. We aim to understand whether pandemic settings affect physician comfort with research practices, and how physician experiences shape their understanding of research in a pandemic setting.MethodsA survey tool was adapted to evaluate familiarity and comfort with research during a pandemic. A cross-sectional, online questionnaire was distributed across Canadian research networks early in the COVID-19 outbreak. The survey was administered between March 11th and 17th, 2020, during a time of local transmission but prior to the surge of cases. We aimed to recruit into the survey physicians in infectious disease and critical care research networks across Canada.ResultsOf the 133 physician respondents, 131 (98%) considered it important to conduct clinical research during the COVID-19 pandemic. Respondents were more accepting of adaptations to the research process in during a pandemic compared to in a non-pandemic setting, including conducting research with deferred consent (χ2 = 8.941, 95% CI: -0.264, -0.085, p = 0.003), using non-identifiable observational data with a waiver of consent with a median score of 97 out of 100 (IQR: 79.25-100) vs median 87 out of 100 (IQR: 63-79) (95% CI: -12.43, 0.054, p = 0.052). The majority felt that research quality is not compromised during pandemics.ConclusionsPhysicians consider it important to conduct research during a pandemic, highlighting the need to expedite research activities in pandemic settings. Respondents were more accepting of adaptations to the research process for research conducted during a pandemic, compared to that conducted in its absence of a pandemic.

Dataset Information

Collaborative and partnership research for improvement of health and social services: researcher's experiences from 20 projects.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Collaborative and partnership research for improvement of health and social services: researcher's experiences from 20 projects.

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