Focus on health policy research: Professor John Lavis, International Scientific Advisor, visits GERI

20 March 2024

Professor John Lavis posing with Professor Ding and Professor Lim during his visit to GERI

On 29 Feb and 1 Mar 2024, GERI welcomed its International Scientific Advisor, Professor John N. Lavis to the Institute’s offices to share in-person insights, meet with faculty and researchers, as well engage them on their health policy research projects. Professor Lavis is a leading expert on evidence-informed policymaking. He directs Canada’s McMaster Health Forum and the WHO Collaborating Centre for Evidence-Informed Policy, and also co-leads the Global Commission on Evidence to Address Societal Challenges.

During his visit, Professor Lavis addressed GERI researchers and staff on “Supporting Evidence-informed Policymaking: Building Capability and Starting Work”, where he shared best practices for supporting the production of timely research evidence to address policy challenges.

Professor John Lavis giving a lecture to a room of attendees

Professor Lavis also sat down with GERI’s Health Policy Group researchers to discuss ways to deepen researcher-policymaker linkages and provide feedback on projects that the Group has tackled. These projects, which address some of Singapore’s critical policy challenges on dementia and frailty, include evidence syntheses on brief tools to identify possible dementia (read more) and on short geriatric assessment tools—both aimed at older adults in the community.

Professor John Lavis interacting with his group during a breakout session

Among the key concepts that emerged over the visit were timeliness and a desire for impact:

As policy cycles move quickly, clarity is needed from the onset in anticipating, hearing and scoping the policy question; systematically prioritising what needs to be addressed; identifying the best ways and people to address them, and supplying the research evidence to policymakers in a timely manner to match their tight operating timelines.
What motivates his team at the Health Forum and the Commission, Professor Lavis noted, is impact. Even if policymakers may not make immediate use of the evidence, at least the information was brought to the decision-making table—a small but important step towards the development of better policy.

For more, click here to read our Q&A with Professor Lavis on closing the gap between research evidence and decision-making in health policy.