As part of its commitment to reducing the gap between research findings and evidence-informed decision-making, the Translation and Dissemination Institute’s 24-month Rapid Evidence Reviews Project, which began in May 2015, will pilot innovative approaches to quickly, but rigorously identifying and communicating evidence to inform public and private decision-making. The Institute will test these approaches by applying them to questions relevant to building a Culture of Health, the current focus of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the project’s funder. Through successive rounds of rapid evidence reviews, the project will experiment with three facets of the process:
- The innovative use of technology and other tools to crowd-source, refine, and prioritize the most important questions for those seeking to address the social and other determinants of health;
- Approaches to rapidly, yet rigorously reviewing evidence that incorporate the best elements of similar programs from both inside and outside the United States; and
- Innovative approaches to assuring that finished reviews reach the right national, state, and community-based audiences and inform decision-making.
With each successive rapid evidence review, the project will refine the quality of the work while also reducing the amount of time necessary to complete it.
The Rapid Evidence Reviews Project is supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.