Grant: Doctoral Research Award - Priority Announcement: Knowledge Translation

The use of evidence in clinical decision making, or the concept of "evidence based medicine", has generally been widely accepted in healthcare as the optimal avenue to provide the best possible care. A movement toward "evidence based management" or the use of similar processes and concepts in administrative decision making has also received attention. According to the literature, evidence based management has not been as broadly accepted and implemented as has evidence based medicine. The proposed research will be aimed at 1. understanding how senior hospital executives make strategic decisions, 2. how they define evidence, and 3. whether or not and how this evidence is used in organizational strategic decision making. Given that strategic decisions are highly resource intensive and are critical to hospital directions on key issues regarding patient care delivery, these decisions will be explored. While there are interesting comparisons of the use of evidence based medicine and evidence based management, it is important to note that evidence used in management may have different outcomes and endpoints, different theoretical frameworks, different literature and different contexts and cultural norms that impose various influences and expectations on decision makers and their decision-making processes. Evidence based management is an important field to explore in order to contribute to, and broaden, the current knowledge base and by doing so, potentially influence management behaviour. The proposed research is aimed at helping to inform and support enhanced healthcare delivery systems by uncovering theoretical and practical foundations to the implementation of evidence based management.