Grant: Catalyst Grant: Partnering for Impact - Strategy for Patient-Oriented Research

Overdose is the leading cause of death in British Columbia (BC) for people aged 19-59. The BC Provincial Overdose Cohort (BC-ODC) is a set of health datasets that are linked together for people who have died of fatal overdose in the province, or who have come in contact with health care for non-fatal overdose. These data have been used to inform approaches to reducing overdose risk since 2016. The BC-ODC data are now available in a new data platform which provides more updated data (updated monthly) than was previously available. Our team has co-led a process with provincial partners to identify new priorities for research with the updated BC-ODC data. We have gathered survey responses from >50 respondents (i.e. health service providers, decision-makers, community drug user organizations). Through this process, we have identified three priority topic areas that will be used to organize and plan our team's upcoming research. The overall aim of this project is to establish infrastructure to increase the potential impact of research that uses the BC-ODC data. The goal is for us to work with partners to "co-produce" research so that we can use these data to more meaningfully respond to the priorities and interests of partners. These efforts will improve the relevance and impact of these data on the provincial overdose response. The study goal will be accomplished with three specific project objectives: Objective 1: To establish working groups and co-develop working group governance. Objective 2: To develop knowledge mobilization plans for each working group. Objective 3: To evaluate the co-production process. Through the planned activities and expertise of our team, we will establish infrastructure to develop and mobilize research driven by the needs of partners. The project will be well positioned to produce timely and relevant outputs to inform efforts to reduce overdose events in BC and nationally, in the context of an ongoing public health emergency.