This study aims to assess id21's success in increasing the influence of UK-funded research within international development policy. It begins by examining the ways in which policy-makers access and employ research. The study then uses these findings to assess the validity and performance of the dissemination methods id21 currently uses.
Monitoring equity and research policy
Tracking routes towards impact: id21 study on research to policy linkages
The utilisation of health research in policy-making: concepts, examples and methods of assessment
Increasing global attention is focusing on ways to improve health systems and the contribution that research-informed policies can make to this. It has long been recognised that a range of factors is involved in the interactions between health research and policy-makers. The emerging focus on Health Research Systems (HRS) has identified additional mechanisms through which greater utilisation of research could be achieved. Assessment of the role of health research in policy-making is best undertaken as part of a wider study that also includes utilisation of health research by industry, medical practitioners, and the public. The utilisation of health research in policy-making should eventually lead to desired outcomes, including health gains, says an article in Health Research Policy and Systems.
Does X Really cause Y?
Good public policy decisions require reliable information about the causal relationships among variables. Policymakers must understand the way the world works and the likely effects of manipulating the variables that are under their control. The purpose of this paper from The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Changes in Health Care Financing and Organisation (HCFO) is to assist policymakers by providing an introduction to some of the problems associated with causal inference from empirical data. The paper also will be helpful to researchers who are attempting to draw causal inferences from data, or explain their results to policymakers.
Reproductive Health and Health Sector Reform in Developing Countries: Establishing a Framework for Dialogue
There has been a marked lack of dialogue on policymaking between the areas of reproductive health and reform of the health sector. Policies in each area have been developed by different actors, pursuing different objectives. Consequently, disjointed policy-making has tended to predominate. A framework is proposed for enhancing such dialogue and collaboration between the two fields, with reference to links between actors, an understanding of policy contexts, the development of compatible aims and the need for institutional strengthening.
An Integrated Framework for Developing Health, Policy, and Research
From the Milbank Quarterly, Volume 80 Number 3, 2002
This article describes the Life Course Health Development (LCHD) framework, which was created to explain how health trajectories develop over an individual’s lifetime and how this knowledge can guide new approaches to policy and research. The Life Course Health Development (LCHD) framework offers a new approach to health measurement, health system design, and long-term investment in health development and also suggests new directions for research.
TRACKING ROUTES TOWARDS IMPACT: RESEARCH TO POLICY LINKAGES
Research on international development investigates new policies and strategies that can help in the fight against global poverty and for a better standard of living for all. But there is little point to this research if it is not communicated effectively to the people who have the ability to act on its recommendations and implement the necessary changes. Who are these people, what types of research are they interested in, and what are the best ways to communicate this research to them? In early 2002, id21, the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex, set about addressing these questions by surveying, interviewing and collecting comments from over 1900 NGO and aid agency staff, politicians, policy-makers, students and researchers. The results of these surveys have now been analysed to produce a comprehensive set of insights into how development research and its effective communication can influence policy and help bring about social change. A summary of reports is available from http://www.id21.org/id21-info/impact/summary.pdf, while the full report is available from the URL provided below.
Malaria in pregnancy – still high-risk after 20 years of research
Every year about 24 million African women become pregnant in areas where the risk of malaria is high. They are more likely than other adults to become infected and this increases the risk of poor pregnancy outcome. Results of a study, funded by the UK Medical Research Council and conducted in The Gambia, emphasise the need for improved management of pregnancy and labour. Since the first study 20 years ago, several trials have produced recommendations on strategies to tackle maternal malaria. This serious public health problem may persist due to a lack of collaboration between scientists and policy-makers or because existing policy is not fully implemented. The researchers suggest that policy-makers should: Implement effective malaria control strategies for pregnant women, including the use of insecticide-treated bednets, and drugs to prevent and treat malaria; Ensure that control measures start as early as possible in pregnancy; Strengthen their working links with researchers and; Conduct community-level research to guide programmes, and monitor and evaluate success.
Narrowing the 10/90 gap: directing funding for health research towards those who need it most
Of the US$73 billion spent globally every year on health research only about 10% is actually allocated for research into 90% of the world’s health problems. This is what is known as the 10/90 gap. This third landmark report of the Global Forum for Health Research underlines the crucial role that health and health research funding plays in breaking the cycle of poverty.The report covers progress towards narrowing this gap over the past two years and outlines plans for the coming years. The report stresses that prioritisation of health research spending at the global and national levels is a necessity if research funds are to have the greatest impact possible on the level of world health. However, it also notes that setting priorities in terms of individual diseases is not enough and that cross-cutting influences such as the capacity of a country to deliver health services, the necessity to look at gender differences, behaviour and lifestyles harmful to health, and environmental problems like indoor air pollution must also be considered.
Directory of Training Programs in Health Services Research and Health Policy
The Directory of Training Programs in Health Services Research and Health Policy provides key information about U.S., Canadian, and European post-baccalaureate certificate, master's, doctoral, and postdoctoral programs in the fields of health services research and health policy. Each program profile lists: program objectives, program focus, degree(s) offered, program director(s), senior faculty and primary research interests, tuition, financial aid, average completion time, average number of students, start date, program structure, language of instruction, application requirements, and contact information. The training directory is an online resource that is updated continuously as we receive new and updated program information.
Life Course Health Development: An Integrated Framework for Developing Health, Policy, and Research
Neal Halfon and Miles Hochstein, The Milbank Quarterly, 2002
This article describes the Life Course Health Development (LCHD) framework, which was created to explain how health trajectories develop over an individual’s lifetime and how this knowledge can guide new approaches to policy and research. Based on the relationship between experience and the biology and psychology of development, the LCHD framework offers a conceptual model for health development and a more powerful approach to understanding diseases. The article illustrates how risk factors, protective factors, and early-life experiences affect people’s long-term health and disease outcomes. A better understanding of health development should enable us to manipulate early risk factors and protective factors and help shift our emphasis on treatment in the later stages of disease to the promotion of earlier, more effective preventive strategies and interventions focused on maximizing optimal health development.