Global Community Of Practice Research Articles

Guiding Principles for Community Building in Global Oncology.

With the escalating incidence and prevalence of cancer worldwide disproportionately affecting low- and middle-income countries, there is an urgent need for the global oncology community to foster bidirectional partnerships and an equitable exchange of knowledge, resources, and expertise. A dedicated Global Oncology Community of Practice (CoP) can serve as a self-organizing, grassroots approach for members, with common goals and values, to coordinate efforts, maximize impact, and ensure sustainable outcomes. It is imperative, however, when outlining goals and priorities to adhere to an ethical and appropriate framework during community building efforts to avoid perpetuating inequities and power imbalances. This article reviews the core guiding principles for ASCO's Global Oncology CoP which includes responsibility, amplification, accessibility, sustainability, and decolonization.

Playful by Design: A Third Space Community of Practice for Game Studies & Design

This paper traces the history and development of Playful by Design, a cross-campus initiative at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign from which the interdisciplinary Game Studies & Design program emerged. Interdisciplinary collaborations bridge differences between academic cultures and can spur innovative research and new programs and initiatives. Games, understood both as objects of study and as a methodology for conducting research on topics other than games, are moving into the mainstream within multiple academic disciplines; that doesn’t mean that interdisciplinary game studies must disappear as an intellectual endeavor. Playful by Design has become a local and global community of practice in which shared and overlapping interests in game-relevant research of all kinds, but also design, pedagogy, and technology, provide a durable interdisciplinary third space. As a network, it can welcome multidisciplinary activities pursued by teachers, scholars, artists, and designers within their own disciplines and in their own ways. Through creative collaborations, the sharing of resources, and the growth of team-based studio work and other experiential learning, this approach facilitates the emergence of transdisciplinary and glocal aspirations. These include shared values of accessibility and inclusion, reflected in how we teach and conduct research, and in the design and creation of games, simulations, and other interactive and immersive experiences that address the critical shared challenges of our times.

FRI-174 - Challenges and strategies to improve linkage to care and treatment for hepatitis C in pregnancy: perspectives from a global community of practice

FRI-174 - Challenges and strategies to improve linkage to care and treatment for hepatitis C in pregnancy: perspectives from a global community of practice

Permaculture: A Global Community of Practice

Permaculture design seeks to create sustainable communities, and over time has established itself as a transnational community of practice. Based on original interviews with permaculture practitioners from around the world, and drawing on the three core elements of communities of practice – shared domain, communality and shared practices – as our analytical framework, this paper makes three arguments. First, the shared domain of permaculture as a body of knowledge, a system of ethics and set of practical design principles creates an overarching teleological regime that anchors the globally dispersed collective activities of permaculture practitioners. Second, communality in the international permaculture community is centred around the permaculture design course, national and international permaculture convergences, and organisations and demonstration sites that act as hubs for practitioner interaction, linked across national borders by social media networks. Third, shared practices in the permaculture community centre on relationship-building and local-level community organisation.

Global community of practice: A means for capacity and community strengthening for health professionals in low- and middle-income countries.

BackgroundLow- and middle-income countries face distinct challenges in providing health care services and training. The community of practice (CoP) has been described as a method of facilitating much-needed connections and conversations on this topic and has been adapted over time to include virtual CoPs. We describe the development and evaluation of a global Clinical Lead Forum (CLF) using a CoP framework to structure informal continuing professional development (CPD) and enhance the capacity of health care professionals in low- and middle-income countries.MethodsBaylor College of Medicine International Pediatric AIDS Initiative (BIPAI) and its network of affiliated, independent non-governmental organizations (NGOs) provide paediatric and maternal health care for vulnerable populations around the world. We established virtual sessions across the network to discuss clinical topics, which evolved based on the need to include a COVID-19 series. We collected demographic, participation, participant and facilitator assessments, as well as leadership notes from each session as part of an educational quality improvement study. We developed and evaluated the program using the Logic Model and used the Kirkpatrick Model to assess learning outcomes.ResultsA total of 299 unique participants engaged in sessions, representing a total of 10 disciplines. There were a total of 1295 participants who joined for the 11 sessions in the regular CLF series and the 23 sessions in the COVID-19 series. Survey responses were overall consistent with a value-added intervention.ConclusionsThe CLF, via both the regular sessions and the COVID-19 series, served as an impactful global health CoP for CPD. By focusing on creating a safe and inviting space, ensuring equity and inclusion, activating champions, fostering engagement, and promoting innovation and adaptability, this program decreased professional isolation, strengthened peer relationships, and enhanced the knowledge and practices of health care professionals. Our model may be scaled to other systems across the world to bridge divides and create similarly meaningful communities.

Leveraging the Client-Provider Interaction to Address Contraceptive Discontinuation: A Scoping Review of the Evidence That Links Them.

Despite considerable investment and effort, unmet need for contraception remains an obstacle to improved family planning outcomes. One influencing factor is the frequency of contraceptive discontinuation among users who desire to prevent pregnancy, often due to method-related concerns and side effects. Contraceptive users have the right to be supported during counseling to voluntarily choose methods that align with their individual needs and preferences. Contraceptive counseling, as a key component of quality of care, is particularly important for providers to reduce unmet need among their clients. This scoping review examined the state of the evidence on contraceptive counseling and its impact on discontinuation. The review first examines the association between quality of care and contraceptive discontinuation, then looks to what the current body of evidence suggests are women's contraceptive counseling priorities, and lastly, explores whether specific counseling tools and approaches have been evaluated with discontinuation as an outcome. The results identified general principles and priorities for good counseling including person-centeredness, client-tailored information exchange, clear and concise information on side effects and bleeding changes, reducing providers' implicit and explicit biases, and trust and respect between the client and provider. The review of the literature also found that evidence to support the use of specific counseling tools and approaches to reduce contraceptive discontinuation is insufficient; research should be designed to determine which specific elements of the client-provider interaction can be improved to significantly impact contraceptive discontinuation. This evidence could inform how the global community of practice might improve and leverage specific counseling approaches and tools to address the most common predictors of discontinuation.

Shaping future food system leaders

Shaping future food system leaders

Disrupted gender roles in Australian agriculture: first generation female farmers’ construction of farming identity

This article examines the experiences of female farmers in the Australian context who neither married into nor were born into farming and how they construct their farmer identity. Drawing on interviews with seventeen first generation female farmers it demonstrates a detraditionalized farmer identity created in response to concern for environmental and social sustainability. They are enabled by an online, global community of practice and shifting narratives of what constitutes responsible farming. Participants leveraged their skills from previous occupations to their farming enterprises to internalize a managerial and entrepreneurial farming identity. First generation female farmers have been empowered as new actors in Australian agriculture, reflecting a disruption in traditional patterns of gendered privilege.

Mental Health Literacy: A Strategy for Global Adolescent Mental Health Promotion

Background: Adolescence is defined by key transitional elements which are considered within a cross-cultural context. The importance of building mental health capacity for adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) as well as high-income countries (HICs) is reviewed. Objectives: To review the developmental period of adolescence, global needs for mental health promotion, the needs of LMICs while emphasizing building adolescent mental health capacity, and the importance of efforts to promote mental health literacy. Methods: Mental health literacy (MHL) is presented as a strategy that can increase public awareness regarding mental health issues among adolescents. Increased awareness through an MHL framework is discussed as a way to build adolescent mental health capacity; with this work ideally occurring through global communities of practice (COP), dialogue, collaboration, and mutual support that aim to build innovation in systems of mental health promotion. Results: The authors review structural components in research, practice, and policy that seek to build global adolescent mental health capacity, nested within COPs involving HICs and LMICs working together to advance mental health promotion for children, adolescents, and young people. Conclusion: The article concludes with a discussion of how the three structural components (i.e., research, practice, and policy) can address gaps in the provision of global mental health services for adolescents to meet adolescent mental health needs in LMICs and HICs. A multi-sectoral approach emphasizing a global COP is presented as a way to scale up capacity and maximize outcomes.

The FAO/WHO International Food Safety Authorities Network in Review, 2004-2018: Learning from the Past and Looking to the Future.

Contemporary patterns of global food trade necessitate cross-border communication between government authorities when unsafe food enters international commerce. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)/World Health Organization (WHO) International Food Safety Authorities Network (INFOSAN), established in 2004, facilitates urgent communication between >600 members from 188 of the 194 FAO and WHO Member States around the world and supports the strengthening of food safety systems in an effort to mitigate the global burden of foodborne disease. For nearly 15 years, INFOSAN has been operating as a global, virtual community of practice (CoP), fostering knowledge transfer and exchange between members, and enabling crucial international communication during food safety emergencies. During this time, a number of important partnerships have been forged, including with other networks like PulseNet International. Complementarity, and cooperation between global networks like INFOSAN and PulseNet is vital to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of global efforts to curb foodborne illness. Since 2011, detailed data related to the patterns of information exchange during 293 food safety emergencies communicated through INFOSAN have been documented systematically. An analysis of these data reveals that a relatively limited number of active members from a select group of Member States contribute the majority of information exchanged through the network. For example, nine (5%) Member States were each involved in 24 or more food safety events communicated through INFOSAN between 2011 and 2017, whereas 123 (65%) Member States were involved in three events or less, including 36 (19%) involved in none. These data also demonstrate that although the overall responsiveness of members during emergencies has improved in recent years, impediments to rapid and efficient information sharing still persist. A number of potential barriers to active participation in INFOSAN have been hypothesized, but members themselves have not been conferred with on their relative importance. As a member-driven network, future research to investigate the experiences of INFOSAN members in a rigorous and systematic manner is recommended. Such work could illuminate the specific areas in which to introduce operational shifts by the INFOSAN Secretariat, to strengthen the global CoP, increase the value of INFOSAN among members, and have a robust and meaningful impact at country level to reduce the burden of foodborne disease globally.

Biodiversity Information for Development: Building a global community of practice to mobilize and use biodiversity data

Biodiversity Information for Development, or BID, is a programme funded by the European Union and led by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), aiming to increase the amount of biodiversity information available for use in scientific research and policymaking. In its first phase, BID provided funding to 61 projects in the nations of sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific between 2015-2019, with a strong focus on developing capacity to mobilize, manage and use biodiversity data within the project teams and their institutions, and through the establishment and strengthening of national nodes. The capacity development approach centred on establishing a community of practice to bring in the expertise in the broader GBIF network to support the project teams in meeting their goals. This involved designing curricula for two workshops in the areas of data mobilization and data use for decision making; developing activities and materials to strengthen a base of mentors and trainers; establishing technical helpdesk support; and matchmaking to provide mentoring support to the funded projects. The community of practice, through mentoring and reuse of the workshop materials, has been expanded to support the capacity development needs in other programmes, reaching other regions, including Asia, South-East Europe and Eurasia. During this presentation, we will review the main findings of the BID impact study and guiding examples from within the BID programme to identify the key successes and lessons learned relating to capacity development. As this approach has wider application to the biodiversity community, we invite discussion how we can build on the experience through the BID programme to further develop our community of practice, narrowing knowledge gaps between various groups of biodiversity professionals.

Working with gender in transformative education and supervision: Unpacking the invisible handbag

As an educator and professional supervisor, I am physically located in Aotearoa New Zealand and I am also part of a global community of practice. My increased access to online global discourses on both feminism and social work has led me to critically examine my work, in particular in relation to the social justice imperative implicit in my professional roles.

From local organisational harmonisation to Global change leader: a story of operational success

Introduction: (comprising context and problem statement) Like many countries, Ireland is facing a rise in chronic disease and the underutilisation of healthcare delivered to patients in the community. Services comprise publicly funded hospital and community services, and independent general practitioners. There is overreliance on hospital services and a lack of community services to provide alternative care. Short description of practice change implemented: CareDoc is a not-for-profit organisation and works as a service providing trusted third party, funded by item-of-service charges. It developed Community intervention team (CIT) services and offered them to move care from inpatient settings to deliver acute care in the community. A CIT is a nurse led service providing acute care to patients in the community, who otherwise would require hospitalisation. There is in house EHR support. Aim and theory of change: The aim is to provide appropriate patients with appropriate care in their community thus preventing unnecessary hospital admission or facilitating early discharge from hospital. The CIT uses strict clinical criteria to accept a patient into the service and must be avoiding a hospital admission or facilitating early discharge. Targeted population and stakeholders: The CIT is for patients over 16 years who require an acute clinical treatment that would usually take place in the hospital setting. Timeline: The first Caredoc CIT model of care concept and design was developed in early 2011 and the first patient accepted in the Carlow and Kilkenny area, covering a population of 145,659, in September 2011. Based on initial success, the Caredoc CIT model of care was extended in: - 2014 South Wicklow Population 118,379 - 2015 Waterford Population 127,807 - 2016 Tipperary Population 94,136. Highlights: (innovation, Impact and outcomes) The implementation required trusted partnership working with all stakeholders, engaging at an early stage, including management, clinicians, and allied health professionals from both primary and secondary care. The team developed and enhanced the relationships between the hospital, community and primary care settings to support patients and care delivery in the community. Comments on sustainability: The number of patients treated by the CIT service has increased annually with 2,866 treated in 2015 and 3,642 from January – October 2016. Comments on transferability: The Caredoc model of CIT has successfully expanded over 4 regions throughout Ireland. Conclusions and Discussion: (comprising key findings) The Caredoc model was included in “Lessons from transforming health services delivery: compendium of initiatives in the WHO European Region” and as a WHO reference site for Connected Integrated Health Service Delivery. Following on from this the Caredoc team have been asked by the WHO to lead a Global Community of Practice on Change Management. Lessons learned - Automatic buy-in not a given - Communication to all stakeholders is key - Key leaders and champions are vital - Do not encroach on clinical time - Arrange meetings to suit stakeholders - Fit-for-purpose IT (inter-operable real-time EHR) is essential - Mutual trust and added clinical value are key enablers

Complex adaptive systems engineering and risk reduction

Complex adaptive systems are central to many persistent problems locally and globally. In cases where the effects of a policy play out slowly and propagate through interdependencies with other systems, the broader view and understanding gained from complex adaptive system analyses allow us to recognise the causal relationships involved and solve persistent system-level issues. This is particularly true with the risks due to climate change, economic crises, energy disruptions and food insecurity. Climate change and the challenge of addressing the resulting global risks provides a common set of problems on which to build a global community of practice that utilises earth systems' engineering approaches and sustainability goals to understand and resolve problems in complex adaptive systems of systems. Structural adaptation under environmental stress, simple rules for entity interactions and condition-dependent behaviours are key attributes of complex systems. These attributes provide the means for creating models that behave the way the real system does and for the same reasons, improving understanding and designing effective solutions. This paper presents general concepts for infrastructure adaptation and examples of successful applications of an expanded engineering process for complex systems of systems.

Conference Report: Applied Pharmaceutical Analysis India 2013 Conference Report

Applied Pharmaceutical Analysis – India, founded by The Boston Society in 2009, is a nonprofit organization that provides a unique platform to researchers in the field of drug discovery and development with specific focus on biotransformation, discovery & regulatory bioanalysis areas. It has been organizing international meetings in India since 2010, and since its inception these meetings have become an important annual event in the Indian pharmaceutical conference calendar. The fourth annual meeting for the year 2013 was held at the Hyderabad International Convention Center, Novotel, Hyderabad, India from 3–6 March. This conference report summarizes an overview of the meeting that was themed as ‘Bioanalysis and biotransformation in advancing drug discovery and development: fundamentals to state of the art’. The event consisted of 1 day of short courses (parallel sessions on discovery bioanalysis and biotransformation) followed by 3 days of workshops (regulated bioanalysis, discovery bioanalysis and biotransformation). The meet was well attended by over 185 delegates and was bestowed with presentations by renowned scientists from India, China, Europe and the USA. This annual Applied Pharmaceutical Analysis meet was a unique opportunity for the organizers and participants to extend their national and international professional network, and align with recent developments in pharmaceutical analysis, discovery/development sciences and regulatory challenges. It also helped establish a global community of practice within India in analytical sciences and allied fields.

Proceedings of the International Workshop on Cancer Advocacy for African Countries

Proceedings of the International Workshop on Cancer Advocacy for African Countries

Self-Help and Leveraging Scale by Means of the Wells' Advanced Collaborative Environment's Global Community of Practice

Summary The Advanced Collaborative Environment Community of Practice (CoP) was formed in March 2009 at the request of BP senior management to share good practice and promote standardization in the area of wells. Its mandate was one of self-help and leveraging scale but working through influence and consensus, with management support rather than by direct authority. The CoP was also required to adhere to company information technology (IT) standards and technology strategy. At the time of the CoP's formation, collaborative environments had been commissioned in various company locations worldwide, including Aberdeen; Baku, Azerbaijan; Houston; Stavanger; and Tangguh, Indonesia. In the absence of standardized requirements for Wells’ collaborative environments and with an emphasis on innovation, each of these centers had been developed independently, strongly influenced by local ideas, needs, and resources. However, it was evident that connectivity between the different locations and with other disciplines was lacking, and that effort was duplicated. The CoP currently has more than 30 members, including Wells, subsurface, IT, and well technology from 12 locations worldwide. It meets virtually, involving the widest possible membership in different time zones. It has been instrumental in progressing and communicating standards, supporting the introduction and use of common tools and technology, leveraging members’ knowledge and expertise, and helping startups in new areas. Overall, the CoP has been a great success. The paper describes the CoP's evolution, from its formation to the present, and critically examines its achievements, shortfalls, and future goals. In a rapidly changing technical environment, achieving and maintaining alignment between the diverse stakeholders in a medium to large organization can be challenging. The CoP has earned its credibility and has proved to be an effective means of sharing experience and making good use of scarce resources, both keys for adoption at scale.

Community, Practice, and Domain Behaviors, and the Moderator Influence of Information Technology among global Communities of Practice: A Meta-Analysis


 
 
 The theory of Communities of Practice (CoPs) emerged in the middle 1990s through the work of Etienne Wenger and other contemporary authors (Wenger, 2004; Wenger, McDermott, & Snyder, 2002; Wenger & Snyder, 2000). Domain, practice, and community are the main dimensions of CoPs, each with a set of defined behavioral dynamics that allow communities of learners to develop continued growth and sustainability. Professional associations and educational institutions are using online CoPs to engage industry and academia in contributing with innovative solutions to everyday problems. The knowledge management theory has defined groups that meet to produce knowledge solutions in response to common interests as invisible colleges, epistemic communities, learning communities, and CoPs. A meta-analysis of 84 research designs dated from 2000 to 2011, and representing 18 geographic areas in more than 20 industries, demonstrated that professional CoPs manifest distinctive behaviors in all CoP structural dimensions as described by Wenger et al. (2002). Reflective collaboration (e.g., community), sense of common purpose (e.g., practice), and innovation, creativity, and solutions to everyday problems (e.g., domain) are the behaviors present with more frequency among global CoPs. The moderator role of information technology for collaboration and knowledge creation is evident in the observed CoP behaviors and dynamics of this meta-analysis. The use of technologies to promote CoPs creates new challenges for organizations, which will be providing more technological services and support to the diverse CoPs’ memberships.
 
 

Proceedings of the 1st Biennial Science of Global Prostate Cancer Disparities in Black Men

Prostate cancer continues to be the most significant cancer proven to disproportionately overburden men of African descent, especially United States (US) Black men. Unfortunately, African American race/ethnicity is one of the three primary non-modifiable risk factors confirmed for prostate cancer.1,2 We are yet to confirm the primary reasons for the disparate burden of prostate cancer among Black men. This problem is further compounded by the fact that prostate cancer has become a major public health problem in developing countries. Thereby, global collaborations among prostate cancer scientists, clinicians, survivors and advocates are important to better understand the etiology of prostate cancer among at-risk Black men, and develop effective interventions to address these disparities. The Science of Global Prostate Cancer Disparities in Black Men conference was organized to: 1. Provide opportunities for mutual learning, knowledge transfer, and collaborations among prostate cancer scientist clinicians, survivors and advocates. 2. Promote trans-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary prostate cancer research globally; 3. Facilitate networking among individuals involved in all aspects of prostate cancer control, education and research in Black men. 4. Facilitate the development of a global community of practice to address common challenges in prostate cancer, including prevention, detection, diagnosis, treatment and survivorship. 5. Contribute to a global impact against prostate cancer through research training and education programs for low-resource countries. The primary goals for participants were to: • Learn - Learn from internationally renowned speakers recognized in prostate cancer disparities and survivorship research. • Discover - Discover the latest research findings on prostate cancer Prevention, Early Detection, Diagnosis, Treatment, Survivorship and End-of-Life. • Connect - Connect with other Researchers, Clinicians, Patients, Advocates and Policy makers from North America, South America, Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean. • Share - Share ideas with other conference delegates involved in all aspects of prostate cancer control and research in Black Men. • Explore - Explore the world of trans-disciplinary prostate cancer research. • Develop - Develop a global community of practice to address common challenges in prostate cancer disparities. The 1st Biennial Science of Global Prostate Cancer Disparities in Black Men Conference was held in the heart of downtown Jacksonville, Florida on August 27-29, 2010. A total of 96 delegates participated in the conference, including 21 patient/survivors, family, and friends. There were 15 international delegates from Africa, the Caribbean, and United Kingdom.

Potential contribution of the Internet to a global community of practice for fishery management

Abstract Garcia, S. M. 2011. Potential contribution of the Internet to a global community of practice for fishery management. – ICES Journal of Marine Science, 68: 1800–1804. Managing complex socio-ecological fishery systems, following an Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries, calls for a broad range of information covering many components of the system, intensified sharing of data and knowledge (to accelerate social learning and adaptive management), and a much tighter collaboration between disciplines and stakeholders. I argue that the time has come to establish one or more communities of practice (sensu Wenger) and that the Internet could be used efficiently for this purpose, enhancing the co-evolution of science and decision-making. Important Internet resources exist and can be mobilized, but the contribution of fishery science is still too fragmented and that of the fishing industry is embryonic. This paper suggests a web infrastructure that would facilitate the needed change.