About the Mobilising Evidence and Knowledge workstream

Louise Goswami: Hello, I'm Louise Goswami. I lead the mobilizing evidence and knowledge workstream of Knowledge for Healthcare.

This short session is one in a series about different strands of Health Education England's knowledge for health care strategy focusing on what the strategy proposes in relation, particularly to mobilizing evidence and knowledge.

I thought it be helpful to start off with a reflection of progress.

So for a reminder of the health care, knowledge for healthcare, vision and and the high level strategic outcomes. And then we want to move on to the priorities for the mobilizing evidence and knowledge workstream over the next 5 years.

So looking back in terms of mobilizing evidence and knowledge previously, it was part of the work associated with delivering proactive knowledge services.

One of the key deliverables over the previous strategy was advocacy.

The hashtag a million decisions campaign that showcased the value and benefits of Knowledge and Library Services through impact case studies and advocacy from senior stakeholders.

We also created a knowledge and evidence self assessment tool for NHS organizations.

One of the big successes was that further development of the knowledge mobilization framework, we expanded a suite of quick reference cards to help staff share learning and also developed associated e-learning.

A key focus of our work has been upskilling our workforce.

We developed a knowledge mobilization toolkit with examples of tools and techniques with what was particularly useful real life case studies that Knowledge and Library Serivce were already using to inform and inspire others to get involved.

We did a great deal of cascade training and webinar demonstrations, discussions of various knowledge mobilisation tools and techniques, all of which have helped to build confidence and capability. 

We also launched what we now call as hashtag Knovember a celebration of all things knowledge mobilisation which was facilitated by librarians and knowledge specialists, spreading good practice and showcasing the great work you're all doing.

A brief reminder of the ambition of Knowledge for Healthcare. It can be paraphrased as the right knowledge and evidence used at the right time and in the right place to make a positive impact on healthcare.

We all know that knowledge is business critical because excellent health care and health improvement are underpinned by informed decision making.

NHS Knowledge and Library Services and their staff are front and center of the strategy because you are all pivotal to delivering the vision.

How have we turned the strategy into action?

As with the first iteration of Knowledge for Healthcare, we've used driver diagrams to shape and describe the strategy. The image shows the high level driver diagram with the ambition - the right knowledge evidence at the right time in the right places.

There are 5 high level strategic outcomes that will drive the delivery of the ambition.

These 5 areas translate into the 5 main Knowledge for Healthcare work streams. The first of these relates to mobilizing evidence and knowledge and states health care organisations, services and systems effectively mobilise evidence, learning knowledge and know how to enable in evidence, evidence based policy and practice. 

This is a rather busy slide, but it's the driver diagram for mobilising evidence and knowledge. It identifies 3 specific outcomes we believe we need to deliver this strategic outcome, and it's reflected at the organisation and system level, the health care staff level, and our knowledge and local workforce listed in the middle. They are organisations, services and systems are effective in mobilising evidence and internally generated knowledge. Healthcare staff apply news evidence, build know how, continue to learn and drive innovation and finally healthcare at Knowledge and Library Services staff manage and mobilise evidence and knowledge.

In turn, there are a number of interventions that will drive those in the right hand column and what I'll try and do in the next few slides is talk a little bit more detail about what those priorities are for the next 5 years.

We know that healthcare is a knowledge industry and that decisions can't be made in isolation, but we need to take into account of individual and organisational knowledge as well as the best available evidence.

We also know that there continues to be some confusion about what we mean by knowledge mobilisation. Within the easy read version of the strategy, this is simply described as getting the right information from different places and sharing it. And this is right, information can be from reports, research the Internet of things, people know but haven't written down. People can also then use this knowledge to help inform their decisions and actions.

We've also developed recently a blog post to articulate what we mean, so hopefully they'll be greater clarity about the understanding of knowledge mobilisation.

We also hope that this visual helps to explain the breadth of what it covers [5:30].

As you can see from the visual, it encompasses evidence, know how data, policies and guidelines, as well as lessons learned. As knowledge specialists, you enable NHS decision makers to take account for a great deal of this. You also share your expertise to help NHS staff find and evaluate the information and knowledge that they need. You can also contribute to nuturing a learning culture which is critical to transformation efficiency and innovation within the NHS. All of which will result in decisions for better care. 

Turning now to how we're going to work with healthcare organisations, we will continue with the hastage a milltion decisions campaign to refresh the strategy to include reference to the new Health and Social Care Act and our value proposition. As part of this, we will focus on promoting hashtage million decisions to employers at national and local levels. We want to highlight the positive impact knowledge mobilisaion has on health organisations through the development of logic models. This builds on research we'd previously commissioned, in turn, the ambition is that this will further work to build on the existing value proposition.

The gift of time that will enable us to determine an economic benefit for knowledge mobilisation activities. We aspire to continue to extend that reach of Knowledge and Library Services. Work will continue with a range of organisations, including the care quality, permission to influence the inclusion of a briefing guide relating to knowledge and evidence, and the role of knowledge specialist within the well laid framework. Building on the previous paper based self-assessment tool work has already begun to digitize this framework. It will enable you to quickly assess how a team or health organisations can make better use of knowledge is an asset. The framework enables a dialogue between a representative of a library knowledge service and a senio, and senior executives in health organisations to see how they're currently using external evidnce and organisational knowledge, and to devise an action plan to help the organisation develop best practice with targeted support in the longer term. The digital tool willalso have a dashboard functionality that will enable you to make comparisons between departments and teams and connect people to people to share learning.

As part of enhancing the skills of the health care workforce,we're going to scope the development of an award in mobilising evidence and Knowledge for Healthcare workforce. Building on market testing work that has already been determined, there is an appetite for this type of learning.

We plan to update hte NHS knowledge mobilisation framework to include techniques for knowledge translation. Health Education England will work with the NHS research community advocating for the expertise of health knowledge and library specialists contributing to research bids, undertaking literature views, or working alongside research teams.

We will build on the previously developed step e-learning modules, will commission the development of e-learning materials and critical appraisal skills for the healthcare workforce. 

As part of knowledge for health care and a wider HE innovation strategy, knowledge translation will be a key deliverable with the ambition that the NHS and its workforce are equipped to transfer, translate and use evidence and knowledge for innovation.

Within health Education England, the intention is to place evidenced, informed decision making and knowledge translation at the heart of our own work and this will enable Health Education England to showcase the benefits of knowledge translation and knowledge.

Map mobilization to drive spread and adoption.

There is an expectation within Health Education England that proposals for innovative developments should be informed by evidence reviews and E cheese.

The Internal Knowledge Management team will have a pivotal role in facilitating the delivery of this.

Across the wider NHS system, Health Education England will facilitate engagement to ensure that the workforce in integrated care systems primary and community care and mental health, as well as an acute settings fully benefit from proactive knowledge and library services.

However, we know that currently there is insufficient staffing levels within the system to deliver on this, so it is our ambition to grow the number of embedded rules building on the hashtag million decisions campaign.

The recommendations in the Topol review and the staff ratios policy that advocate one professional member of staff to 12,150 healthcare staff.

To do this, we know we need to address the funding model. Work contues on this as well as growing the funding pot for provision of Knowledge and Library Services. This will include work to determine the funding required for a high performing service. We've just begun work with primary care training hubs to pilot provision of services and to endeavour to secure recurrent funding.

Further, developing the skills of our workforce are pivotal to the success of the mobilizing evidence and knowledge work and we want to continue to develop your skills.

We intend to continue to run Knovember, which will enable teams and individuals to learn from one another, sharedgood practice and use the tools and techniques that are available.

We plan to re energize the knowledge mobilization community of practice and redevelop the toolkit.

For the digital self assessment tool, we will offer very practical training on how to use the resource, but also commissioned training to develop skills, to have conversations and discussions with senior stakeholders.

We will also continue to review what skill staff need to undertake knowledge, mobilization activities and ensure appropriate learning opportunities are commissioned and developed across the country.

We currently have 30 knowledge mobilization champions and we will continue to draw on their expertise to help shape our work. The intention would be to grow their number and develop the role.

This concludes my presentation.

I hope it's been a helpful overview of the mobilised evidence and knowledge priorities for knowledge for health care.

Thank you for listening.