An Exciting Step Forward: New Support for the Next Generation of Learning-Health-System Researchers
Last fall, we announced an exciting joint initiative from our two organizations—the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) and the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI)—to support the training of clinician and research scientists to conduct patient-centered outcomes research within learning health systems.
Learning health systems align science—generated from health services research, patient-centered outcomes research, and clinical research—with informatics, incentives, and culture for continuous improvement and innovation, with best practices seamlessly embedded in the care process. They are an element of the growing digital healthcare landscape, with potential to improve patient care through real-time data and analytics. However, we need to expand the number of researchers who have the skills to excel in this fast-moving environment.
In particular, we need such researchers who are embedded within a health system to collaborate with system leaders to produce novel insights and evidence that can be rapidly implemented in practice to improve patient outcomes and system performance.
Learning health systems are an element of the growing digital healthcare landscape, with potential to improve patient care through real-time data and analytics.
That’s why we are very pleased to tell you about the awards we’ve just made under this joint program. The 11 institutions that were awarded $40 million in grants over five years will represent a new, driving force to accelerate health system performance and improvements in patient outcomes.
The institutions also will establish Learning Health System Centers of Excellence in Learning Health System Researcher Training. The LHS Centers of Excellence are:
- A Chicago Center of Excellence in Learning Health Systems Research Training (ACCELERAT)
Northwestern University, Chicago, IL - CATALyST: Consortium for Applied Training to Advance the Learning Health System with Scholars/Trainees
Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, Seattle, WA - Learning Health System Scholar Program at Vanderbilt
Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN - Leveraging Infrastructure to Train Investigators in Patient-Centered Outcomes Research in Learning Health System (LITI- PCORLHS)
Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN - Minnesota Learning Health System Mentored Career Development Program (MN-LHS)
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis - NW Center of Excellence & K12 in Patient Centered Learning Health Systems Science
Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, OR - PEDSnet Scholars: A Training Program for Pediatric Learning Health System Researchers
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia - Stakeholder-Partnered Implementation Research and Innovation Translation (SPIRIT) program
University of California, Los Angeles - The Center of Excellence in Promoting LHS Operations and Research at Einstein/Montefiore (EXPLORE)
Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY - Transforming the Generation and Adoption of PCOR into Practice (T-GAPP)
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia - University of California, San Francisco Learning Health System K12 Career Development Program
University of California, San Francisco
The goal for AHRQ and PCORI is to increase the use of evidence and health system data to improve the quality of care and health of patients. These projects will increase the impact of investments in research on how learning health systems can improve the quality and safety of health care for all patients.
We are eager to follow the work of these talented grantees with high expectations that their findings will add significantly to our understanding about the best possible strategies for improving patient health.
This post was jointly published on AHRQ Views, the official blog for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Gopal Khanna, MBA, a coauthor of this blog post, was director of AHRQ and served on the PCORI Board of Governors from May 2017 – January 2021.