“In healthcare, we must not only do our work, but also improve our work. This requires the evidence base we will build through the Improvement Science Research Network.”
Kathleen R. Stevens ISRN Director
Purpose
The Improvement Science Research Network (ISRN) aims to accelerate the development and dissemination of interprofessional improvement science in a systems context across multiple sites. Across the country, healthcare experts, administrators, researchers, and clinicians are devising and testing new strategies to improve the safety and quality of patient care.
Yet, while patient safety and quality improvement in bedside care are clearly-stated national priorities, improvement science remains in a nascent stage, particularly in the area of multidisciplinary care processes within the hospital setting.
The ISRN actively drives advancements in improvement science by:
Creating an infrastructure for multidisciplinary acute care providers to collaborate on improvement science projects through ISRN membership
Directing national improvement science research priorities
Supporting Network members in developing theories, methods, and designs for achieving rigorous improvement science research
Offering central data management and expert analysis for improvement science research studies
Creation of the ISRN
The need for a large-scale and multi-site Improvement Science Research Network has long been evident to healthcare practitioners. While a solution in the form of a national research network seemed logical and desirable, the resources required to develop human capacity and collaborative technology infrastructure were largely unavailable.
The unprecedented availability of sizable funding through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) presented the unique opportunity to form such a network. On May 29, 2009, a plan was submitted to, accepted, and subsequently funded by the National Institute of Nursing and the National Institutes of Health, and the Improvement Science Research Network was created.
ISRN aims and key strategies are described in the abstract of the proposal.
The Steering Council is composed of 12 healthcare experts from both private and public organizations. The aggregate expertise of this multidisciplinary group reflects advanced knowledge of healthcare improvement and guides the ISRN research priorities and activities.
The ISRN Coordinating Center is housed within the Center for Advancing Clinical Excellence at UT Health San Antonio. Founded upon a longstanding commitment to clinical and translational research, the ISRN Coordinating Center partners with the Institute for Integration of Medicine and Science (IIMS) to further reduce barriers to research and to strengthen the science of quality improvement.
