Mobile ICT support for the continuum of care.

The Wireless Wearable Physiological Monitor (WWPM) is designed to provide unobtrusive, regular, remote physiological monitoring of clients within their home environment. Its goal is to provide enough health support functions to enable its user to remain at home while being under a limited form of medical supervision. The WWPM solution will reduce the care burden on families and friends while providing a level of continuous care for the ill or elderly. The WWPM solution is a combination of non-invasive sensors that monitor a person's physiological data and a two-way communication system that allows the physiological data to be sent to a central computer application. The central application can interpret the data received and automatically prompt the client to take appropriate action or alert a care provider who can intervene with the needed support. The central application is intended for use by care providers within the traditional continuum, that is, as a component in a patient's health management or care plan. It is this combination of data, professional care and communication that will produce the medical and behavioral outcomes necessary for individuals to manage their health outside of traditional health service institutions.

Broadening the patient safety agenda to include safety in long-term care.

The recent patient safety literature has included less of an emphasis on long-term settings than on research in the acute care sector. Recognizing this knowledge gap in our understanding of safety in the long-term care sector, the Canadian Patient Safety Institute, Capital Health (Edmonton) and CapitalCare (Edmonton) have collaborated to create a research and action agenda for improving resident safety in Canadian long-term care settings. This collaboration resulted in the development of a background paper highlighting the current state of the science and 14 key-informant interviews with stakeholders across Canada. The background paper subsequently informed an invitational round-table discussion. Key findings from the key-informant interviews as well as implications for research are described in this article.

Broadening the patient safety agenda to include home care services.

Caring for an individual in the home is inherently complex. The physical environment, family dynamics and the cognitive abilities of the client and family members are only a few of the factors to be considered in delivering services. Although targeted initiatives have been established to reduce preventable injuries and deaths in the hospital sector, there has not been a corresponding level of research or patient safety initiatives in other healthcare delivery sectors. A coordinated and collaborative approach to generate new knowledge pertaining to safety in home care in Canada has therefore been undertaken by the Canadian Patient Safety Institute (CPSI), VON Canada, and Capital Health (Edmonton). Actions included the development of a background paper (Lang and Edwards 2006) that informed an invitational roundtable discussion, where key safety issues in home care were identified and priority actions discussed. Over 40 individuals from across Canada participated, reflecting various disciplinary and organizational affiliations in the delivery of home care services. This paper describes key findings from the background paper, outcomes from the ensuing roundtable discussions and implications for practice, research and policy.

Scholar-in-Residence: An Organizational Capacity-Building Model to Move Evidence to Action.

Quality improvement healthcare leaders recognize that striving for excellence is dependent on a multitude of complex and interactive factors. Translating evidence into clinical practice guidelines, evidence-informed decision-making processes, and policy documents does not, however, guarantee that evidence will reach the point-of-care. This article describes an innovative engagement strategy called the Scholar-in-Residence program. The program represents a model of collaboration between a health region and a university, which is intended to build organizational research capacity while simultaneously facilitating quality in hospital care for seniors. We explain the program and provide implementation details with examples to illustrate how the program builds organizational research capacity at the point-of-care, where healthcare is delivered by professionals, and received by patients admitted to a hospital. By explaining the challenges we encountered, others interested in developing research engagement activities in their health region are assisted and pitfalls are avoided.