Wishful thinking will not do it! Practitioners and decision-makers need tools to implement evidence-informed public health

Excerpt

In this issue of IJPH, we feature a paper which reports on the development and implementation of a registry of methods and tools to support evidence-informed public health practice (Peirson et al. 2013). Most discussions about evidence-based public health practice focus on the “what”, discussing the type of evidence practitioners and decision-makers need in their practice. Consequently, most registries and resources available for practitioners to develop evidence-informed programs and interventions are made of research syntheses and knowledge products that provide scientific answers to practical public health questions. Examples of such questions are: “What are the most efficient interventions to increase influenza immunization coverage in a community?” or “What are the effective policy options to address youth obesity in a rural community?” The integration of such tools and products into public health practice is often taken for granted or, at best, not problematized as a legitimate research question in—and of itself. The registry presented in this issue is unique in two ways: it addresses the “how” in implementing evidence-informed public health practice and decision-making (Larsen et al. 2012), and it tackles the root causes of the problems of translating and using research evidence in public health. Its development started with the question “What is the scientific evidence about what works for increasing and improving knowledge translation and exchange practices in public health?” The registry identifies, sorts and indexes relevant and evidence-informed, as well as methods and tools that support the dissemination and integration of evidence-based practice in public health organizations. …