Taking stock: understanding key processes in the public health programs—stages of research and evaluation framework

Abstract

The complexity of research translation is well recognized. Efforts to accelerate the process have emerged through implementation science, scale-up, scalability, and sustainability. This area of research is now inundated with a plethora of new concepts, creating overlap and confusion for those working in public health, implementation science, and scale-up as well as those seeking to understand it. This perspective examines the commonly used processes (scale-up, scalability, transferability, sustainability) and articulates their current definitions found in the literature. An explanation of the similarities and differences is also provided along with an illustration of where they may be applied in the public health programs: stages of research and evaluation framework. This perspective aims to clarify these processes, in order to provide guidance for seeking to engage in this area, how and when those processes might apply for those new to the field as well as those working within it.