Abstract
BackgroundAddressing the uptake of research findings into policy-making is increasingly important for researchers who ultimately seek to contribute to improved health outcomes. The aims of the Swiss Programme for Research on Global Issues for Development (r4d Programme) initiated by the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation are to create and disseminate knowledge that supports policy changes in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This paper reports on five r4d research projects and shows how researchers engage with various stakeholders, including policy-makers, in order to assure uptake of the research results.MethodsEleven in-depth interviews were conducted with principal investigators and their research partners from five r4d projects, using a semi-structured interview guide. The interviews explored the process of how stakeholders and policy-makers were engaged in the research project.ResultsThree key strategies were identified as fostering research uptake into policies and practices: (S1) stakeholders directly engaged with and sought evidence from researchers; (S2) stakeholders were involved in the design and throughout the implementation of the research project; and (S3) stakeholders engaged in participatory and transdisciplinary research approaches to coproduce knowledge and inform policy. In the first strategy, research evidence was directly taken up by international stakeholders as they were actively seeking new evidence on a very specific topic to up-date international guidelines. In the second strategy, examples from two r4d projects show that collaboration with stakeholders from early on in the projects increased the likelihood of translating research into policy, but that the latter was more effective in a supportive and stable policy environment. The third strategy adopted by two other r4d projects demonstrates the benefits of promoting colearning as a way to address potential power dynamics and working effectively across the local policy landscape through robust research partnerships.ConclusionsThis paper provides insights into the different strategies that facilitate collaboration and communication between stakeholders, including policy-makers, and researchers. However, it remains necessary to increase our understanding of the interests and motivations of the different actors involved in the process of influencing policy, identify clear policy-influencing objectives and provide more institutional support to engage in this complex and time-intensive process.
Highlights
Addressing the uptake of research findings into policy-making is increasingly important for researchers who seek to contribute to improved health outcomes
Three key strategies were identified for research uptake into policy and practice throughout the data collection of this synthesis initiative: (S1) stakeholders directly engaged with and sought evidence from researchers; (S2) stakeholders were involved in the design and throughout the implementation of the research project; and (S3) stakeholders engaged in participatory and transdisciplinary research approaches to co-produce knowledge and inform policy
Improving the Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) care cascade in Lesotho: towards 90‐90‐90—a research collaboration with the Ministry of Health of Lesotho In this r4d project, the research team was approached by the International Aids Society (IAS) and the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, based on the publication of their study protocol [17], introducing their innovative research approach of same-day antiretroviral therapy (ART) initiation in rural communities in Lesotho: “They [international stakeholders] were all keen of getting the results out and requested evidence of the randomized controlled trials
Summary
Addressing the uptake of research findings into policy-making is increasingly important for researchers who seek to contribute to improved health outcomes. The aims of the Swiss Programme for Research on Global Issues for Development (r4d Programme) initiated by the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation are to create and disseminate knowledge that supports policy changes in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Research funders are asking their grantees to address the uptake of research findings into decisionmaking processes and policy-making [1, 2] This growing trend is a response to a need for real-world and contextsensitive evidence to respond to and address complex health systems and health service delivery bottlenecks faced by policy-makers, health practitioners, communities and other actors that require more than single interventions to induce large-scale change [3]. Its specific objectives are to create and disseminate knowledge that supports policy-making in the area of global development and foster research on global issues in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development [5, 6]
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