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Share Your Innovations >
How Innovations Are Selected
This page spells out the minimum requirements for innovations included in the AHRQ Health Care Innovations Exchange and lists AHRQ's priorities for this program.
To be considered for an Innovation Profile, health care innovations have to meet six criteria.
Innovations that meet all but the last criterion on effectiveness may be presented as Innovation Attempts.
These are minimum requirements. The ultimate decision to publish a description of your innovation will depend on several
factors, including an evaluation by the Editorial Teams, AHRQ's priorities (see below), and the number of similar
ideas in the Innovations Exchange.
If you think your innovation meets most or all of the minimum requirements and wish to submit it for our
consideration, go to Share Your Innovations. If you have any
questions about these criteria, contact us at info@innovations.ahrq.gov.
- The innovation focuses directly or indirectly on patient care.
Your innovation does not have to involve direct patient care or direct contact
with health care consumers. However, it must have important implications for the delivery of patient care—whether preventive,
emergent, chronic, acute, rehabilitative, long-term, or end-of-life. Innovations that involve devices,
tools, technology, software, curricula, policies, procedures, and changes to the physical environment qualify
only if they have an impact on the delivery of health care services to patients.
- The innovation is intended to improve one or more domains of health care quality.
Your innovation must be designed to address one or more specific measurable indicators of quality in one or more of the
domains defined by the Institute of Medicine: effectiveness, efficiency, equity, patient-centeredness, safety, and
timeliness. The indicators you use do not have to come from an established measure set, but they must be clearly
defined and relevant to the quality issue your innovation addresses. Also, your innovation must not contradict
established standards of evidence-based care.
- The activity is truly innovative in the context of its setting or target population.
For the purposes of the Innovations Exchange, innovations are activities that are generally perceived as new in a
particular setting or for a particular population relative to the usual care processes. In addition to brand new
ideas, we welcome activities adapted from other industries to health care, transferred from one health care
setting or market segment to another, drawn from settings in other countries, or applied to a new or different
patient population. You must be able to communicate how your innovation differs from what is regarded as standard
practice in your organization and among similar organizations.
- Information about the innovation is publicly available.
You must be willing to make enough information freely available to enable a user of the Health Care Innovations
Exchange to understand the elements of the innovation and make a decision about adopting it. This requirement
does not exclude innovations that incorporate commercial
products or other materials for which there may be a fee or licensing requirements. It is not necessary for all information about the
innovation to be
publicly available, but the Editorial Teams will need access to
information with sufficient detail to produce a comprehensive description.
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The innovator (or a representative) is willing and able to contribute information to the Health Care Innovations Exchange.
Someone knowledgeable about the innovation must be willing to participate in interviews with one of our Editorial Teams and share written information about the innovation where available. This person must confirm that he or she is able to speak on behalf of any collaborating organizations. In addition, this person must be able to provide the name of a contact person who can be listed in the description of the innovation.
- There is reason to believe that this innovation will be effective.
You must be able to provide some evidence that the innovation is likely to achieve its goals. Ideally, we would
like you to provide some quantitative or qualitative support for a link between the activity and improved performance
on the defined quality indicator. However, if data are unavailable, limited, or lacking in methodological rigor,
the design or theoretical foundation of the innovative activity may serve as sufficient support.
The Editorial Teams will be aiming for breadth in both the settings and services covered by the Health Care
Innovations Exchange. If we receive a large number
of submissions, our evaluations of candidate innovations will weigh how well the
innovation fits with priorities established by the Agency for Health Care
Research and Quality (AHRQ). These priorities include the following:
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Vulnerable populations. AHRQ is interested in identifying innovations that will help
to reduce disparities in health care and health status. Populations of interest to AHRQ are low-income groups, minority groups, women, children, the
elderly, and individuals with special health care needs.
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Potential for high impact. The Innovations Exchange
will give preference to innovations that are likely to have a significant effect
on the overall value of health care. Impact may be defined in different ways, e.g., the
innovation may affect a broad population, address a critical health issue, or demonstrate large cost
savings.
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Innovator interest in participating. All else being equal, AHRQ will give priority to
innovators who express a strong interest in becoming involved in other activities of the Innovations Exchange,
such as participating in learning networks and providing commentaries.
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AHRQ-funded innovations. The Innovations Exchange will aim to include innovations that are or
were funded by the Agency.
Last updated: March 28, 2008.
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