Health execs identify barriers and benefits to research that matters

Dr. Eric B. Larson leads the Institute of Medicine workshop on integrating research and practice. 

Drs. Eric B. Larson and Karin Johnson asked delivery system leaders about the challenges and rewards of research. Read their findings in Modern Healthcare.

Opportunities are expanding for health care systems to participate in clinical and health services research. To reap the benefits of a study, however, health care leaders say they must be intimately involved in planning, designing, and executing projects.

Integrating research and clinical practice was the topic of a 2014 workshop from the Institute of Medicine (now the National Academy of Medicine) and Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI). Group Health Research Institute's Dr. Eric B. Larson and Dr. Karin Johnson led the event and an accompanying survey of health care executives.

In a commentary in the industry publication Modern Healthcare, Drs. Larson and Johnson outline the results of the workshop and survey. They describe the challenges to health care research that were most frequently named by delivery system executives. They also explain two specific opportunities—pragmatic trials and big data networks like PCORnet—for researchers and clinical leaders to participate in national projects with the potential to transform clinical practice.

Read more, including Dr. Larson's thoughts on what the survey says about return on investments in health information technology. Read about how Group Health generates and applies clinical evidence in Dr. Larson's Annals of Internal Medicine issues paper (subscription required) with Sarah M. Greene and Dr. Robert J. Reid. 

by Chris Tachibana