RNAO partners with HEC on updated online toolkit

TORONTO – Maintaining its commitment to advancing evidence-based care and healthcare, the Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario (RNAO) has partnered with Healthcare Excellence Canada (HEC) to release its third edition of the Leading Change Toolkit^™.

The Leading Change Toolkit^™ is a free online implementation resource that provides change agents – persons developing knowledge and skills to make a positive difference – and change teams with up-to-date evidence, tools and strategies to lead change across health sectors and settings. Change teams may include interprofessional practitioners, persons/patients and their families, administrators, students, educators, as well as other staff or volunteers in organizations and across integrated teams.

This dynamic, freely accessible resource replaces RNAO’s 2012 toolkit and features two complementary frameworks to support the uptake and sustainability of evidence:

1. Social Movement Action (SMA) framework (Grinspun et al., 2020) – a new framework that integrates social movement action to create lasting change for improvement.
2. Knowledge-to-Action (KTA) framework (Graham et al., 2006) – a dynamic systematic and structured process model.

RNAO and HEC launched the toolkit during a national webinar on Tuesday, Oct. 5. The webinar introduced the toolkit and its features, as well as provided an overview of how to use it to mobilize change.

“The Leading Change Toolkit^™ is a groundbreaking online resource that will revolutionize how healthcare professionals and teams implement best practices within their organization,” says Dr. Doris Grinspun (pictured), RNAO CEO and co-chair of the toolkit’s expert panel. Adding that “the two complementary frameworks set change agents and teams up for success, which will improve quality of care and health outcomes for all.”

“As a living resource, the toolkit will be updated regularly to embrace innovations in the field of implementation science aimed at facilitating social movements of knowledge to action, ensuring evidence-among health teams in different sectors reaches every staff and every patient on every encounter,” says Dr. Janet Squires, expert panel co-chair of the Leading Change Toolkit^™.

“Shaping a future where everyone in Canada has safe and high-quality healthcare is in our collective interest,” says Dr. Jennifer Zelmer, president and CEO of HEC. “Through resources like this toolkit, people who share this commitment to change will be better equipped to drive the rapid adoption of quality and safety innovations across the country.”

For more information on the Leading Change Toolkit^™, please visit RNAO’s website.

About Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario (RNAO)
The Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario is the professional association representing registered nurses, nurse practitioners and nursing students in Ontario. Since 1925, RNAO has advocated for healthy public policy, promoted excellence in nursing practice, increased nurses’ contribution to shaping the health system, and influenced decisions that affect nurses and the public they serve. For more information about RNAO, visit RNAO.ca or follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

About Healthcare Excellence Canada (HEC)
Healthcare Excellence Canada is an organization with a relentless focus on improving healthcare, with – and for – everyone in Canada. Launched in March 2021 from the amalgamation of the Canadian Patient Safety Institute and the Canadian Foundation for Healthcare Improvement, Healthcare Excellence Canada has greater capacity to support partners to turn proven innovations into widespread and lasting improvement in patient safety and all the dimensions of healthcare excellence. We believe in the power of people and evidence and know that by connecting them, we can achieve the best healthcare in the world. HEC is an independent, not-for-profit charity funded primarily by Health Canada. For more information, visit www.healthcareexcellence.ca.