There is a substantial gap between the development of innovations in medicine, public health, education and other fields and their delivery in hospitals, communities and schools. Implementation science is an emerging field that is dedicated to the study of closing this gap by scientifically identifying the factors that facilitate and impede the systematic uptake of knowledge and evidence. It includes the study of how individual, organizational and environmental behavior impact implementation effectiveness, and how to develop and test strategies to change these behaviors. This course will provide an overview of the core theories and methods in implementation research and practice. Students will have opportunities to apply these principles through a case study.

Learning Objectives:

• Define implementation science
• Describe how implementation science connects to allied fields such as quality improvement and design thinking
• Define implementation outcomes are how they are connected to and different from health outcomes.
• Describe key implementation models, theories and frameworks, their application in various settings, and how they can be used to guide implementation efforts.
• Identify individual, organizational and systems level determinants affecting the quality of implementation.
• Understand how to develop effective strategies for sustainable and scalable implementation
• Describe the most common research designs and evaluation approaches in implementation science