SIRC 2024 Preconference Workshops

Considering context across the lifespan of implementation

Julia Moore, PhD, The Center for Implementation; Sobia Khan, PhD, MPH; The Center for Implementation

This workshop will explore practical ways to understand and address contextual factors (organizational and system factors), including considerations for readiness, adaptations, and sustainability. There are many frameworks for assessing context, but relatively little practical guidance exists on selecting strategies to address contextual factors. This workshop will focus on these factors. This workshop will introduce Context Compass, an interactive online tool that participants can use to assess and address context in their work. Workshop participants will leave with approaches, a tool, and strategies that they can use to address contextual challenges.

Learning Objectives:

Apply a framework for assessing context across the lifespan of implementation
Identify factors impacting implementation (barriers and facilitators) at multiple levels
Consider the importance of different factors over the lifespan of implementation (e.g., decision to adopt, assessing fit, readiness, implementation, sustainability)
Select appropriate strategies to address challenges and leverage facilitators at different points during the implementation process.

Advancing Health Equity through Co-Creation across the Spectrum of Research, Practice, and Policy

Paul Estabrooks, PhD, University of Utah; Mónica Pérez Jolles, PhD, MA, University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus; Katy Trinkley, PharmD, PhD, University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus; Borsika Rabin, PhD, MPH, PharmD, University of California, San Diego; Amy G. Huebschmann, MD, MSc, University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus

This workshop will leverage a variety of didactic, discussion, and interactive activities to support participants in applying novel dissemination and implementation science (DIS) tools and methods to co-create research projects, services, and policy that advance health equity. The ideal participants in this workshop are those with a basic understanding of DIS principles, theories, models, and frameworks (TMFs), and research methods. As envisioned, this will be an intermediate level workshop focused on co-creation processes of (1) engaging representatives from a diverse set of key community or clinical partners, (2) planning and designing new or adapted interventions and/or implementation strategies that allow all participants (organizational, community, and individual) an opportunity to benefit, and (3) iterative evaluation strategies that ensure relevant outcomes are assessed for all partners to allow for advances in local practice improvement and policy development to achieve sustained, generalizable public health impact. Suited participants for this workshop are IS researchers and implementation practitioners with a basic understanding of DIS principles, TMFs, and research methods. For those in community or clinical practice settings and are interested in implementation, we anticipate some collaborative experience with research or program/policy design would be of benefit.

Learning Objectives:

Describe how to apply a DIS TMF, using the Practical, Robust Implementation and Sustainability Model (PRISM) which includes the RE-AIM outcomes as an example, to the process of co-creation and planning for impact
Develop an assessment of an example project using the iPRISM webtool to optimize program impact, equity and sustainability
Apply knowledge gained from learning about a newly developed co-creation guidebook to consider co-creation of interventions for advancing health equity

Partnering for Sustainable Financing of Evidence-Based Practices in Implementation Research and Practice: Tools to Navigate the Storm

Alex R. Dopp, PhD, MA, RAND Corporation; Marylou Gilbert, JD, MA, RAND Corporation; Cherise Rohr-Allegrini, San Antonio AIDS Foundation

Sustained delivery of evidence-based practices (EBPs) is essential to their large-scale impact. Unfortunately, limited and fragmented funding is a major barrier to EBP implementation and sustainment in community-based service organizations.¹ This workshop aims to inform partnered strategic planning efforts among researchers, implementation practitioners (e.g., trainers, facilitators), and service organizations to identify sustainable financing strategies for EBPs. The workshop will first discuss eight domains of EBP sustainment capacity from the Public Health Sustainability Framework,² with a particular emphasis on the strategic planning and financing stability domains. Attendees will learn to self-assess their programs’ sustainment capacities, using tools based on the framework (e.g., Program Sustainability Assessment Tool; www.sustaintool.org). We will then present the Fiscal Mapping Process, a structured strategic planning tool that service organizations and coaches can use to select the optimal combination of financing strategies for EBP sustainment.³ Attendees will review the five steps of the Fiscal Mapping Process (identify resources needed, specify funding objectives, select financing strategies, create fiscal map, monitor/sustain) and consider how the tool could be applied to plan for sustainable funding in their own projects and partnerships. As a case example, we will discuss the experiences of an HIV service organization currently working to sustain a motivational interviewing-based brief intervention (MIBI) for substance use. The presenters will include researchers, facilitators, and representatives from the HIV service organization. Throughout the workshop, the service organization representatives will share invaluable perspectives on collaborating with implementation researchers and practitioners to address issues of sustainable funding, including application of the Program Sustainability Assessment Tool and the Fiscal Mapping Process. We will also highlight the process of adapting these resources for application in the novel setting of HIV service organizations. Overall, the workshop will be structured, but include ample opportunities for discussion, questions, and active reflection among attendees and presenters.

Learning Objectives:

Attendees will be able to describe EBP implementation and sustainment capacities that inform strategic planning and financing priorities
Attendees will be able to identify key steps and tools, derived from implementation theory and community-partnered practice, that can guide planning for sustainable financing of EBPs
Attendees will be able to approach community-academic partnerships in ways that effectively support and study issues of sustainable financing for EBPs

Justice-centered implementation research and practice: Laying the foundation and building a collective vision

Megan Stanton PhD, MSW, Eastern Connecticut State University; Katie McCormick, MSW, University of Texas at Austin; Samira Ali, PhD, MSW, University of Houston

Are you interested in promoting equitable implementation in your work? Are you keenly aware of the ways power and social injustice impact implementation decision-making in research, policy, and practice, and want to learn more? Though, increasingly, implementation researchers and practitioners identify equity and justice as critically important considerations in implementation, there is less guidance regarding how to integrate an equity focus into implementation research and practice and there are limited opportunities to learn specific skills and acquire conceptual tools necessary to center equity in implementation. Further, though individual researchers and practitioners have advanced equity-centered implementation science, there have been few opportunities to gather as a community to take stock of current gaps and opportunities regarding equity in implementation. In this workshop, presenters will review the current research and theory related to power and implementation, including their work articulating a typology of power generated through implementation. Presenters will then discuss their use of structured critical questions to guide analysis of power in implementation projects. In doing so, presenters will draw on the practical experiences of over 75 HIV service organizations they have coached through the implementation process. Attendees will be asked to bring a project – in any stage of implementation – and will work through a guided reflection process to analyze the role of power in their work and build strategies to enhance equity and justice in their projects moving forward. The second half of the pre-conference workshop will be devoted to building a collective vision of justice-centered implementation. We will engage in a facilitated, collaborative process to identify strengths, gaps, and future actions to promote equity and justice in implementation research and practice, culminating in an action and advocacy agenda. This agenda will be taken up as part of the launch of the ‘Health Justice Implementation Lab”, an interdisciplinary collective of researchers and practitioners committed to justice-centered implementation research and practice. This workshop will be led a group of scholars associated with the SUSTAIN Wellbeing COMPASS Coordinating Center and experts at the Eastern Connecticut State University, the University of Houston, and the University of Texas at Austin

Learning Objectives:

Describe how power and social injustice impact implementation
List and define three types of power that impact implementation
Apply critical questions to identify how participants’ implementation projects generate and are influenced by epistemic, material, and discursive power
Develop a plan to enhance the equity potential of their projects
Engage in collective vision building for justice-centered implementation
Build a justice-centered implementation action agenda for improvements on your project, future projects and the broader field of implementation science