Sustainment
Sustainment, Evaluation Dissemination and Scalability
Evaluating and Summarizing Impact and Effectiveness
Keeping Your Progress Going
Congratulations! You've reached the final phase of the Implementation Roadmap: Sustainment. This phase ensures that your efforts continue to bear fruit and that your program remains effective over time.
What is Sustainment? Sustainment, also known as continued progress and program support over time , involves several essential tasks:
- Impact Evaluation Effectiveness: This phase requires continuous monitoring of your evidence-based practice's fidelity, quality, outcomes, system impacts, and return-on-investment. You'll work with various stakeholders to develop and adapt feasible plans to modify your approach, making it self-sustaining without relying on external support.
- Adaptations for Long-Term Success: You likely identified additional adaptations needed during the Implementation Phase to ensure your practice's long-term success. These adaptations go beyond initial changes and are essential to prevent a return to old practices.
- Sharing Your Findings: It's crucial to capture lessons learned and share them with others and especially organizational decision makers to benefit from your experience.
Evaluating and Summarizing Impact and Effectiveness
To evaluate your program's impact and effectiveness effectively, you need a comprehensive evaluation plan that includes:
Your evaluation should answer critical questions, such as:
- What gap did the program aim to address, and how successful was it?
- What were the most important outcomes, with both quantitative and qualitative data?
- Were there any unexpected effects on other outcomes?
- How did results evolve over time and with adaptations?
- What lessons did you learn during program delivery?
- What were the costs and budget impact, from multiple perspectives?
Example of Evaluation Summary
| Issue | Summary of Results Regarding Issue |
|---|---|
Key Gap | Low patient satisfaction scores in the Emergency Department (ED). Need for improved patient experience during ED visits. |
Most Important Outcomes | Patient satisfaction scores measured on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being highly satisfied. |
Other Effects, Including Any Unintended Effects | Decrease in wait times and improved communication with patients and families. |
Results Over Time (And Over Setting or Staff As Appropriate) | Patient satisfaction scores increased from an average of 5.3 (baseline) to 8.7 (latest assessment). |
Key Lessons Learned | Regular communication training for ED staff, shorter wait times, and improved patient-staff interactions positively impact patient satisfaction. |
Create Your Own Evaluation Summary
Use the provided template to create your evaluation summary tailored to your project, setting, and partner priorities. [template]
Displaying Your Results
Effective communication of your results is essential. Consider your audience and tailor your message accordingly. Decide on the best medium to deliver your findings, whether it's a one-page executive summary, a detailed report, a newsletter, or a presentation.
Sharing Your Findings
Collect data on how the intervention is performing and share it with key decision-makers. Plan for a final report from the project's outset, tailored to the interests and priorities of your stakeholders.
- Process analysis (e.g., reach, adoption, implementation)
- Effectiveness analysis, including safety
- Ongoing sustainability and scalability analysis
- Economic analysis
Ongoing monitoring, audit and feedback
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Ensuring Long-Term Success
Evaluating Impact: In this phase, you'll assess the impact and effectiveness of your program:
1. Summarize the Impact
Gather data to evaluate the program's overall impact and effectiveness.
2. Adaptations for Sustainment
Make adjustments as necessary to ensure long-term use and success.
Key issues are summarizing and sharing results including cost, as well as estimating sustainment/replication costs
3. Sharing Your Findings
Communicate your findings with stakeholders to maintain transparency.
4. Time and Cost Tracking and Reporting
Keep track of time and costs associated with the program and report them as needed.
Implementation