Abstract
BackgroundResearch funders expect evidence of end user engagement and impact plans in research proposals. Drawing upon existing frameworks, we developed audit criteria to help researchers and their institutions assess the knowledge exchange plans of health research proposals.FindingsCriteria clustered around five themes: problem definition; involvement of research users; public and patient engagement; dissemination and implementation; and planning, management and evaluation of knowledge exchange. We applied these to a sample of grant applications from one research institution in the United Kingdom to demonstrate feasibility.ConclusionOur criteria may be useful as a tool for researcher self-assessment and for research institutions to assess the quality of knowledge exchange plans and identify areas for systematic improvement.
Highlights
Research funders expect evidence of end user engagement and impact plans in research proposals
We developed criteria for assessing knowledge exchange plans within research proposals that could be applied to a sample of grant proposals and fed back to researchers
We extracted candidate knowledge exchange principles and recommendations from a review and synthesis of knowledge exchange frameworks, supplemented by existing guidance issued by United Kingdom (UK) research councils [6,7,8,11]
Summary
Research funders expect evidence of end user engagement and impact plans in research proposals. If researchers have followed recent advice to embed knowledge exchange principles and mechanisms throughout the entire lifecycle of a research project [2,5], it may be relatively difficult for reviewers to directly comment on this aspect of a proposal. This situation offers little scope for researchers to learn about how knowledge exchange can be better incorporated into the research process. There is a risk that researchers will come to see knowledge exchange and impact plans as a ‘tick-box’ exercise rather than considering how these could genuinely improve the entire research project
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