Research Communities
AHRQ offers many resources to enable and encourage a growing primary care research community. These resources range from networks of primary care clinicians and practices working together to answer community-based research questions to tools and guidance to clinicians on how to integrate behavioral health and primary care, to practice facilitation support to primary care practices to help them improve the care they provide.
Practice-Based Research Networks
Practice-based Research Networks (PBRNs) are groups of primary care clinicians and practices working together to answer community-based healthcare questions and translate research findings into practice. Typically, PBRNs draw on the experience and insight of practicing clinicians to identify and frame research questions whose answers an improve the practice of primary care. By linking these questions with rigorous research methods, the PBRN can produce research findings that are immediately relevant to the clinician and, in theory, more easily assimilated into everyday practice. Select for more information on PBRNs.
The Academy for Integrating Behavioral Health and Primary Care
The Academy for Integrating Behavioral Health and Primary Care serves as a national resource and a coordinating center for people committed to delivering comprehensive, whole-person healthcare. Behavioral Health integration is the care that results from a practice team of primary care and behavioral health clinicians, working together with patients and families, using a systematic and cost-effective approach to provide patient-centered care for a defined population. A special section of the Academy's Web page is dedicated to community collaboration.
Practice Facilitation
Practice facilitation is an approach to supporting improvement in primary care practices that focuses on building organizational capacity for continuous quality improvement. Practice facilitators are specially trained individuals who work with primary care practices to make meaningful changes designed to improve patients’ outcomes. To assist practice facilitators in gaining critical skills, AHRQ has developed interactive training modules.
