The Research Impact Assessment Framework (RIAF) has been developed by the University of Sydney to enable more strategic and targeted investment towards health and medical research (HMR), having the potential for significant public benefit.
The RIAF is a novel approach to assessing research impact which moves beyond traditional metrics such as academic achievement but considers the real-world value generated through health and medical research.
It is critical for Australia to have a healthcare system that is sustainable, effective, responsive and innovative. While several tools exist to measure the impact of research, few assess the research environment that nurtures and supports impactful research and the strategic alignment of research with societal needs.
The RIAF has been designed as a versatile tool to cater to the diverse needs of any organisation engaged in health and medical research.
Its development has been centred around creating a flexible solution that can effectively be rolled out in state health departments, local health districts (LHDs), universities, medical research institutes (MRIs) and non-academic research organisations alike, irrespective of their location - be it metropolitan, rural, or regional sites.
The RIAF aims to guide organisations in making funding decisions that build an equitable and sustainable HMR ecosystem and enable organisations to deliver impactful research that is aligned to state and local health needs.
The RIAF identifies capability gaps in the ecosystem that can be addressed to accelerate research translation and amplify the impact generated for health and medical research funding.
The RIAF can foster a health and medical research ecosystem that prioritises value-based research, ensuring that research endeavours are focused on delivering tangible benefits to society, aligning seamlessly with the needs of NSW’s healthcare system.
The RIAF increases transparency and visibility in priority areas to maximise value creation from the available research funding.
Using the RIAF to develop case studies will measure and communicate the impacts generated from an organisation’s health and medical research investment.
Publicly available case studies can encourage research organisations to maximise value creation and the relevance of their research to Australian health priorities.
The RIAF can be used to identify capability gaps within an organisation’s environment or across the HMR ecosystem. This can inform investment decisions to accelerate research translation and amplify the impact of HMR investments.
The RIAF scores can be used to benchmark organisations against state averages or best practice. This will drive quality improvement across the HMR ecosystem.
Unlike traditional ranking-based approaches that only reward high performers, the RIAF can be used to guide the funding of targeted initiatives that align with strategic priorities and equitably build the collective capability of the HMR ecosystem so that it can generate long-term, sustainable value-based research aligned with the needs of NSW’s healthcare system.
The Research Impact Assessment Framework (RIAF) has been developed by the University of Sydney, in collaboration with Deloitte and NSW Health.
The team would like to thank all the organisations involved in the pilot of RIAF, including Nepean Blue Mountains Local Health District, Sydney Local Health District, Northern Sydney Local Health District, Centenary Institute, and the Sydney Children's Hospital Network.
