Name
#7 - Cultivating an Implementation Science Capability in the Defense Health Agency through Consultation Support and Infrastructure Development
Date & Time
Tuesday, February 13, 2024, 12:00 PM - 7:00 PM
Description

Innovative practices and tools supported by the latest research are urgently needed to advance military health care and maximize the readiness of warfighters. To address this need, the Defense Health Agency’s (DHA) Implementation Science Branch (ISB), a support function within the Research & Engineering Directorate, offers consultation support and develops infrastructure to facilitate the establishment of an enterprise-wide implementation science (IS) capability. ISB partners with organizations across the enterprise to help effectively transition mature, priority, evidence-based guidelines into practice to optimize their impact. During consultation projects, ISB applies a systematic approach to project management, dissemination, implementation, and assessment (PM, D, I, & A) and coaches partners to sustain these practices post-consultation. Support follows a structured process of developing clearly defined project scope and goals, gathering an engaged group of stakeholders and subject matter experts, creating targeted materials and strategies, and monitoring projects closely to ensure follow-through and optimized outcomes. ISB’s leading practices enable reduced time and effort for translation of clinical solutions into common practice and have been validated through several pilots and scale up programs. Sustainment is emphasized throughout the project lifecycle. While ISB provides expertise in PM, D, I & A, partners provide input on relevant clinical content, ensuring they are prepared to replicate processes without ISB support. To assist practitioners with applying and sustaining leading practices outside of consultation partnerships, ISB disseminates resources, such as standardized tools and templates and a comprehensive guidebook. ISB has collaborated with partners and stakeholders across the DHA on several access to care initiatives. Beginning in 2022, ISB partnered with the Women’s Health Clinical Management Team to roll out walk-in contraceptive services (WiCS) at military hospitals and clinics across the Military Health System (MHS) within a three-month period. ISB assisted program leads with establishing peer-to-peer workgroups, developing trainings and provider resources, cultivating champions at each site, and measuring compliance. 100% of WiCS were stood up by the deadline, increasing access to contraceptive care for active duty service members and other eligible beneficiaries. In 2021-2022, ISB partnered with the Neuromusculoskeletal Clinical Community and Rehabilitation Clinical Management Team to develop standardized processes and materials for Direct Access to Physical Therapy (DAPT). DAPT aims to enable rapid access to physical therapy care for service members who have experienced acute musculoskeletal injuries. ISB developed a sustainable plan to spread and scale this practice across the MHS, including a standardized booking protocol that was piloted at a large market to ensure usability. The initiative is currently being scaled across several markets. To gauge the impact of consultation projects and how PM, D, I & A, best practices were effectively adopted by partners, ISB has developed pre- and post-consultation adoption metrics. Following a full consultation project, partners have shown a 38% increase in adoption of IS leading practices. ISB is demonstrating that through a robust consultation approach and comprehensive set of resources, IS leading practices can be effectively used to transition evidence-based solutions into practice and improve provision of care for service members and their families.

Location Name
Prince Georges Exhibit Hall A/B
Content Presented on Behalf of
DHA
Learning Outcomes
1.Apply IS leading practices to translate research into practice. <br />
2.Develop strategies for building coalitions across the Defense Health Agency (DHA) enterprise to leverage stakeholder engagement and support for an evidence-based solution. <br />
3.Describe the benefits of collecting and tracking performance metrics as a method of reviewing implementation progress and developing strategies to address implementation challenges.
Session Type
Posters