ArticleHealth research policy and systems2020
Applying systems thinking to knowledge mobilisation in public health.
Article in Health research policy and systems, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 32 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
32 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Tools for assessing the scalability of innovations in health: a systematic review.Health research policy and systems · 2022Pooled it
- Participatory systems modelling to improve mental health systems in Bogotá, Colombia: stakeholders' perspectives, experiences and networks.International journal of mental health systems · 2026Article
- Participatory systems science modeling with coalitions identifies common dynamics that drive health trends and disparities in seven communities across the United States.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Applying participatory systems approaches to enhance child mental health in local communities in Denmark: a process evaluation.Health research policy and systems · 2026Article
- Using systems thinking to guide the dissemination of the European code against cancer, 5th edition.Molecular oncology · 2026Article
- Digital Health Innovation by Design: A Logic Model Scaffold for Rural, Regional, and Remote Settings.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Enhancing healthy eating and active play in the Australian early childhood education and care system.Health promotion international · 2025Article
- Towards a complex systems model of evidence for public health.BMJ global health · 2025Review
- An integrated knowledge mobilization approach to substance use health.Health research policy and systems · 2025Article
- Moving from crisis response to a learning health system: Experiences from an Australian regional primary care network.Learning health systems · 2025Article
- A Theoretically Informed Process Evaluation in Parallel to a Feasibility Study of a Complex Oral Health Intervention Using NICE Guidelines in a Care Home Setting.Community dentistry and oral epidemiology · 2025Article
- Enhancing the Innovation Ecosystem: Overcoming Challenges to Introducing Information-Driven Technologies in Health Care.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Processes of development related with the implementation of the Icelandic prevention model in a rural Canadian community.Discover public health · 2025Article
- Optimising knowledge mobilisation for mental health research in low- and middle-income countries: A systematic review of the state of knowledge and directions for future research.Global mental health (Cambridge, England) · 2025Review
- Learning Care Pathways Framework: A New Method to Implement, Learn, Replicate, and Scale up Care Pathways for and With the Patient.International journal of health policy and management · 2025Article
- "All of these things interact, that's why it's such a wicked problem": Stakeholders' perspectives of what hinders low back pain care in Australia and how to improve it.Health research policy and systems · 2024Article
- Adopting a systems-thinking approach to optimise dietary and exercise referral practices for cancer survivors.Supportive care in cancer : official journal of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer · 2024Article
- DiScO: novel rapid systems mapping to inform digital transformation of health systems.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- A new perspective to an old problem - Mobilizing research into policy and practice using an arts and health case study.Frontiers in public health · 2024Article
- A conceptualisation of scale-up and sustainability of social innovations in global health: a narrative review and integrative framework for action.Global health action · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
contextKnowledge mobilisation (KM) is a vital strategy in efforts to improve public health policy and practice. Linear models describing knowledge transfer and translation have moved towards multi-directional and complexity-attuned approaches where knowledge is produced and becomes meaningful through social processes. There are calls for systems approaches to KM but little guidance on how this can be operationalised. This paper describes the contribution that systems thinking can make to KM and provides guidance about how to put it into action.
methodsWe apply a model of systems thinking (which focuses on leveraging change in complex systems) to eight KM practices empirically identified by others. We describe how these models interact and draw out some key learnings for applying systems thinking practically to KM in public health policy and practice. Examples of empirical studies, tools and targeted strategies are provided.
findingsSystems thinking can enhance and fundamentally transform KM. It upholds a pluralistic view of knowledge as informed by multiple parts of the system and reconstituted through use. Mobilisation is conceived as a situated, non-prescriptive and potentially destabilising practice, no longer conceptualised as a discrete piece of work within wider efforts to strengthen public health but as integral to and in continual dialogue with those efforts. A systems approach to KM relies on contextual understanding, collaborative practices, addressing power imbalances and adaptive learning that responds to changing interactions between mobilisation activities and context.
conclusionSystems thinking offers valuable perspectives, tools and strategies to better understand complex problems in their settings and for strengthening KM practice. We make four suggestions for further developing empirical evidence and debate about how systems thinking can enhance our capacity to mobilise knowledge for solving complex problems - (1) be specific about what is meant by 'systems thinking', (2) describe counterfactual KM scenarios so the added value of systems thinking is clearer, (3) widen conceptualisations of impact when evaluating KM, and (4) use methods that can track how and where knowledge is mobilised in complex systems.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.