title: What are the key organisational capabilities that facilitate research use in public health policy?
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Literature about research use suggests that certain characteristics or capabilities may make policy agencies more evidence attuned. This study sought to determine policy makers' perceptions of a suite of organisational capabilities identified from the literature as potentially facilitating research uptake in policy decision making.
  
  
  METHODS
  A literature scan identified eight key organisational capabilities that support research use in policy making. To determine whether these capabilities were relevant, practical and applicable in real world policy settings, nine Australian health policy makers were consulted in September 2011. We used an open-ended questionnaire asking what facilitates the use of research in policy and program decision making, followed by specific questions rating the proposed capabilities. Interviews were transcribed and the content analysed.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There was general agreement that the capabilities identified from the literature were relevant to real world contexts. However, interviewees varied in whether they could provide examples of experiences with the capabilities, how essential they considered the different capabilities to be and how difficult they considered the capabilities were to achieve.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Efforts to improve the use of research in policy decision making are likely to benefit from targeting multiple organisational capabilities, including staff skills and competence, tools such as templates and checklists to aid evidence use and leadership support for the use of research in policy development. However, such efforts should be guided by an understanding of how policy agencies use evidence and how they view their roles, and external factors such as resource constraints and availability of appropriate research.
authors.affiliation: Sax Institute, Sydney, NSW, Australia, Menzies Centre for Health Policy, University of Sydney, NSW, Australia carmen.huckel-schneider@saxinstitute.org.au.
authors.forename: Carmen
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Huckel Schneider
authors.affiliation: Centre for Epidemiology and Evidence, NSW Ministry of Health, Sydney, Australia.
authors.forename: Danielle
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Campbell
authors.affiliation: Centre for Epidemiology and Evidence, NSW Ministry of Health, Sydney, Australia.
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Milat
authors.affiliation: Sax Institute, Sydney, NSW, Australia.
authors.forename: Abby
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Haynes
authors.affiliation: Health Protection NSW, Sydney, Australia.
authors.forename: Emma
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Quinn
mesh_terms: D000288:Administrative Personnel / Q000523:psychology / Q000592:standards; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D001315:Australia; D035843:Biomedical Research / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D003657:Decision Making; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D006291:Health Policy; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D011050:Policy Making; D011634:Public Health / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*