Introduction: The Queensland Professional Leaders in Occupational Therapy (QPiLOT) provides leadership and drives state-wide evidence-based practice to ensure the best outcome for consumers across an Australian state government funded health service. The purpose of the QPiLOT Research Collaborative is to facilitate sharing and advancement of research excellence.
Objectives: The Quality Improvement (QI) to Research Support Initiative aimed to support hospital and community occupational therapists progress their QI projects to formal research.
Approach: The initiative was co-designed and co-produced with consumers to ensure that their perspectives were integral to the process. Successful applicants were mentored by occupational therapists and consumers. Two Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles were the foundation for evaluation.
Results: One mentee successfully completed the Round 1 mentoring cycle. The resultant research protocol was approved by a local Ethics Committee. Mentors, including consumers, continued to be involved in the research. Qualitative interviews were conducted with the mentors and mentees from this initiative. As a result, the submission process for the initiative was revised, and additional support provided to the consumers to better understand the occupational therapy context in applications. Round 2 did not result in a successful applicant. In addition feedback was gained from other QPiLOT clinical collaboratives to identify opportunities for new mentoring applications.
Conclusion: This led to the development of a consultancy workshop to assist applicants refine QI projects inclusive of consumer advice, with the aim of attracting more applications to Round 3. Lessons learned included the value-add of consumer partners in the research team and the knowledge that occupational therapists in busy government funded services required more support than was anticipated to engage in the QI to research initiative.