HCFO: Our Final Year in Review

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2016 has been a year of reflection for HCFO. After nearly 30 years, the final grants funded under the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) Changes in Health Care Financing and Organization (HCFO) initiative are coming to a close at the end of December. Over the last 12 months, we’ve worked to translate the findings from our final grantees and spent time reflecting on the lessons we’ve learned to move actionable evidence that can improve health and health care into the hands of decision makers who need it most. As we think back on the many contributions of the program, we are struck by the power of relationships in strengthening the relevance and use of evidence in health policymaking, and we have many people to thank.

To our grantees…

It has been a privilege to collaborate with some of the best and the brightest investigators to help support the development of usable and timely information on health care policy. Our grantees’ research has made a lasting impact on the evidence base, and your contributions to the field will certainly endure.

To our staff, past and present…

The HCFO program benefitted from the talents and expertise of many health care leaders, including former Program Directors Anne Gauthier and Sharon Arnold, and former Deputy Director Debbie Rogal, who worked in partnership with RWJF to ensure exceptional and successful execution of the program over many years.

To our advisers…

We were guided over our nearly 30-year history by an exceptional National Advisory Committee, comprised of an evolving and diverse group of leading policymakers and researchers who helped shepherd the program and identify the research topics of pressing policy concern.

To our partners…

None of this would have been possible without our partners at RWJF. RWJF Senior Advisor and HCFO Program Officer Nancy Barrand was instrumental in crafting a vision for the program, and she provided exceptional guidance and leadership as the program traversed evolving policy landscapes over multiple decades. RWJF Assistant Vice President Brian Quinn and others at the Foundation were also strong champions of the HCFO program and investigator-initiated research.

We are continuing to work closely with RWJF across a number of initiatives, and we look forward to ongoing work with the Foundation to improve health and health care and to help build a culture of health in America—where everyone can achieve the best health possible.

To read more about how we are building upon the HCFO legacy, check out our AcademyHealth blog.

To read about the lessons we learned from the HCFO program to make research more useful and used, check out our Health Affairs blog.

For information on RWJF grantmaking opportunities, follow @RWJF.

For the latest efforts to move health services and policy research into action, follow @AcademyHealth.

Sincerely,

Bonnie J. Austin
Vice President, AcademyHealth