Sponsoring national processes for evidence-informed policy in the health sector of developing countries - Kyrgyzstan
Promoting the generation of coordinated provincial health protection. A collective process.
In the Kyrgyz Republic, there are five main challenges impeding the effective use of research in policy making: (i) the Ministry of Health has a weak capacity to acquire, adapt and apply research in its decision making processes, (ii) research organizations do not possess communication strategies and channels, relying almost exclusively on informal networks, (iii) there is no regular feedback on policy decisions following research findings and recommendations, (iv) funding for research from the state budget is extremely limited, and (v) use of international evidence in research is limited.
To that end, this project seeks to strengthen linkages between research and policy in order to improve health system performance and health outcomes of the poor. This objective will be achieved through the following four components:
• Strengthening communication channels and capacity;
• Training policy-makers in identifying and applying evidence in decision-making;
• Supporting regular feedback mechanisms between policy-makers to researchers; and
• Monitoring of communication processes and practices and the evaluation of their impact on evidence-informed policy-making.
The key objective of the first component is to strengthen the communication processes and practices with policy-makers at different levels in order to better respond to their policy needs.
• Design of a medium-term communications strategy and action plan; The key objective of the second component is to increase awareness of the roles of research in health system management and policy decisions in order to ensure that evidence-informed policy-making becomes part of the organizational culture reaching all levels of decision makers and does not depend on a few top leaders.
The key objective of the third component is to inform the policy process at national and regional levels with the generated evidence in the most effective and sustainable manner. The component supports two main activities:
The key objective of the fourth component is to understand what types of interventions aimed at promoting evidence-informed policy making at a country level work best and why.
It supports three main activities:
• Training of the HPAU team in principles of external and internal communications, and
• Create mechanisms for networking and collaboration among various producers of research evidence.
• Discussions of research priorities, findings and follow-up policy actions on regular basis with national and regional policy makers; and
• Design and field testing of quarterly policy and research bulletins.
It has three main activities:
• Adaptation of a general M&E methodology developed by the Alliance to country conditions;
• Documenting communications process, research activities and policy actions; and
• Evaluation of the impact of HPAU research on health care policies.
Project description
Programme: Supporting national processes for evidence-informed policy in the health sector of developing countries
Research title: Prospective Evaluation of Evidence-Informed Decision-Making
Thematic Research Area: Evidence to Policy
Grantee Country:Kyrgyzstan
Grantee Institution: Health Policy Analysis Unit, Center for Health System Development
Program Coordinator/Principle Investigator: Dr Gulgun Murzalieva
Start date: August 2007
Status of grant: Ongoing
Note: This grant was not awarded through a competitive call