Why We Need KT

By Kathryn Sibley

My last post addressed the what of Knowledge Translation (KT), and how we define it here at KnowledgeNudge. Today I’m going to focus on why we need KT.

The truth is the traditional “bench to bedside” health research pipeline is terribly inefficient and ineffective at embedding research evidence into health care policy and practice. Several authors have examined the time lag between peer-reviewed health research publication, textbook content, and clinical implementation. These analyses suggest that on average, it takes 17 years for established research evidence to reach practice. 17 years! I don’t know about you, but 17 years ago I had a massive CD collection, and my dad carried his 2-pound mobile phone in its own special case. We would never have dreamed that we’d spend more time video chatting over FaceTime than using our cell minutes. [Editor’s note: If you want to get a true sense of what the world looked like 17 years ago, you need go no further than the Billboard Year-End Hot singles of 1999, which included such timeless classics as Cher’s “Believe,” TLC’s “No Scrubs,” and Ricky Martin’s “Livin’ la Vida Loca.”]

Why some innovations take longer to achieve uptake than others is a topic for another day, but in the case of health research, the implications of these delays can be huge, and often result in substandard care for patients. There are many examples of this in the published literature, but one of the most striking is a 2003 paper in the New England Journal of Medicine that looked at quality of healthcare in the United States. They examined the medical records of almost 7,000 people and looked at over 400 recommended care practices or treatments that reflected the existing knowledge base and a good quality of care.

Here’s what they found: On average, recommended care was received just 55% of the time. That means that almost half of the people in this study could have had something better. If that doesn’t make the case for why we need concerted efforts to move knowledge into action, I don’t know what does. I’d like to think we’ve made some improvements since this study was published, but the truth is, I’m not sure we have.

Now, while these statistics are important, I’m not suggesting that all the gaps between health care knowledge and practice are simply a function of lack of research uptake by research users. Research producers have a role to play too. In one of my upcoming posts, I’ll discuss the concept of “research waste” and how those of us who identify as health researchers need to think critically about our role in knowledge production and translation.

About the Author

Dr. Kathryn Sibley is the Director of Knowledge Translation at the George & Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation (CHI), Canada Research Chair in Integrated Knowledge Translation in Rehabilitation Sciences, and Assistant Professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Manitoba. Find her on Twitter @kmsibley.