Organizations that perform 'Health Policy and Systems Research' (HPSR) need robust capacities, but it remains unclear what these organizations should look like in practice. In this new publication in *Health Policy and Planning,* Harvy Liwanag and colleagues present research findings from the Philippines and propose the model of 'HPSRIs' (pronounced as *'hip-srees'*), i.e., 'Health Policy and Systems Research Institutions' as organizations at the nexus of research expertise, leadership and management, policy translation, and networking that can help meet the purpose of HPSR to 'achieve collective health goals and contribute to policy outcomes.'
Full text: https://doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czae062
Key messages
- Building capacities for Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR) requires strengthening capacities at the individual, organizational and system levels over time, but there exists no structured approach to better understand the attributes that characterize organizations with robust capacities for HPSR.
- To address this gap, we conducted a multi-method study in the Philippines to explore the model of ‘HPSRIs’ (pronounced as ‘hip-srees,’ i.e. Health Policy and Systems Research Institutions) and developed a conceptual framework to analyse their capacities based on eight organizational attributes across the domains of research expertise, leadership and management, policy translation and networking.
- We identified indicators to assess the degree to which HPSRIs attain these attributes, which can inform purposive organizational development efforts. We also analysed the positionality of HPSRIs in the ecosystem and recommend the need to enhance the interactions between HPSR actors and to assign responsibility to a national or regional authority that will foster the HPSR community.
- We proposed HPSRIs to be at the nexus of research, management, policy and networks to perform better in attaining the primary purpose of HPSR, which is to ‘achieve collective health goals and contribute to policy outcomes’.
The broad conceptual framework from this study can guide organizational development for HPSR but must be tailored according to the specific context of every HPSRI.
HIFA profile: Harvy Joy Liwanag is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the United Nations University, Malaysia. harvyliwanagmd AT gmail.com