PHSI Partnerships

As a funding program founded on partnerships, every Partnerships for Health System Improvement (PHSI) project involves collaboration between decision makers and researchers interested in working together to address health system challenges. Any applied health services and policy research topic can be addressed so long as it responds to the information needs of the participating decision makers. Meaningful engagement between decision makers and researchers increases the likelihood that the results of the research will be moved into policy and/or practice. Successful PHSI applications have strong potential for impact and clear decision-maker engagement, as demonstrated by genuine letters of support.

Funding partners

Consistent with the program's emphasis on partnerships, grants are funded through a combination of CIHR and partner funding. CIHR (including CIHR Institutes) provides the majority of funding, and teams are required to bring in 20% of the amount requested from CIHR, from external partners (i.e., non-CIHR partners). PHSI program relies on the participation of partners to promote effective knowledge translation and to increase the resources available to successful teams.

The 20% partner funding from external partners can be cash or in-kind support, or a combination of both. Funding from external partners can come from:

Project-specific partners

Eligible applicants may obtain contributions (cash and/or in-kind) from partners, organizations or decision maker organizations that they identify themselves with and with whom they negotiate directly. Such partners could be universities, foundations, voluntary health charities, hospitals, community groups, provider associations, government departments or the private sector and are critical to demonstrating meaningful engagement on the project.

Competition partners

CIHR has established partnerships specific to this competition with a number of health research funding agencies, Ministries or Departments of Health, and other stakeholders that have expressed an interest in supporting this competition. These commitments are generally restricted either to research on a particular theme, or to researchers from or working on issues that are a priority for a particular province. Although many competition partners only support researchers from their own province, they may also consider supporting other researchers with multi-jurisdictional projects.

Partnership arrangements with competition partners are negotiated directly between the applicant and the competition partner in question. A complete list of partners can be found in the most recent PHSI funding opportunity.

Building partnerships

In collaborative research, as much work needs to go into the partnerships as the research itself. To help teams build meaningful and productive partnerships in preparation for PHSI, CIHR offers PHSI Development Funds of up $25,000 per team available through a separate competition – Planning Grants: PHSI Development Funds – launched three times per year.