Journal of General Internal Medicine (JGIM) editors have picked the top three articles on implementation science for 2019, and two of the three articles were authored by HSR&D investigators.
Lisa Rubenstein, MD, MSPH, authored “Finding Joy in the Practice of Implementation Science: What Can We Learn from a Negative Study?”, which discusses the fear of failure – the rule rather than the exception in implementing research-based interventions within realistic delivery system management structures and constraints. However, thought leaders identify “failure” as the best path to success, and the only way to truly innovate. Dr. Rubenstein effectively implemented outcomes research at the organizational level long before it became popular. She earned the prestigious HSR&D Under Secretary’s Award for Outstanding Achievement in Health Services Research and served a long tenure as Director of HSR&D’s Center for the Study of Healthcare Provider Behavior. Listen to Dr. Rubenstein discuss implementing evidence-based quality improvement in primary care in this HSR&D podcast.
Donna Zulman, MD, MS, and colleagues’ article “Advancing Evidence Synthesis from Effectiveness to Implementation: Integration of Implementation Measures into Evidence Reviews” discusses the feasibility of extracting factors related to implementation during evidence synthesis in order to enhance the replicability of successful interventions in healthcare settings. This is especially important because to fully understand the potential value of a healthcare innovation, stakeholders must consider not only its effectiveness, but also the process, demands, and resource requirements involved in further implementation. Dr. Zulman is a former HSR&D Career Development Awardee, and is currently part of HSR&D’s Center for Innovation to Implementation (Ci2i) in Palo Alto, CA.
