Research translation - our strategy

Principles

Evidence-based

High-quality policies and practices are informed through robust, up-to-date research.

Innovation

Enabling the development and commercialisation of new technologies, services and solutions has the potential to deliver meaningful benefits, support scalability, and drive long-term prosperity across the health and medical research system.

Collaboration

Fostering partnerships and end-user involvement across disciplines, sectors and communities, including place-based partnerships that reflect local priorities and contexts, ensures relevance and uptake of research.

Equity

Diverse voices, trustworthy and culturally safe research, and meaningful community involvement that embed shared authority and accountability to ensure these benefits are realised in practice, are essential to improving health for all.

Implementation

Research should efficiently progress through the translation process to deliver timely outcomes, with flexibility to adapt and scale for local and national needs, prioritising activation over ownership to mobilise knowledge and resources for impact.

Impact

Translating research should lead to real-world benefits, advancing health, wellbeing, productivity and prosperity.

Objectives

• Deliver funding opportunities that enable translation.
• Build workforce capacity and capability in research translation.
• Build a research culture that focuses on impact.
• Foster genuine collaboration between researchers and end-users.
• Promote translation of evidence into equitable, high-quality guidelines and advice.
• Support research pathways to accelerate commercialisation of novel drugs, diagnostics, devices, and digital health technologies.

Priorities, actions and targets 

NHMRC developed research translation priorities to form a framework for the Strategy, with each contributing to ensure that Australian health and medical research delivers tangible benefits to the population. Together, the priorities aim to bridge the gap between research and real-world impact by fostering collaboration, building capability in translation, and ensuring equity in translation outcomes. 

The priorities, actions and targets reflect NHMRC’s commitment to improving health through effective, inclusive and sustainable research translation, and support a range of impacts:

• Health-related
• Social, ethical and legal
• Economic
• Knowledge
• Environmental

Priority 1 – Strengthen partnerships between researchers, consumers and community, end users and industry

• Target 1.1.1: Implement revised objectives, scope, accreditation criteria, and support to strengthen partnerships, inspire research culture in health services, enhance end-user and community involvement and ensure sustainability.
• Target 1.1.2: Assess mid-accreditation progress and promote impact reporting by Research Translation Centres.

Targets:

• 1.2.1. Deliver an implementation and evaluation plan, identifying areas of unmet need and enabling measurable improvements in consumer and community involvement.
• 1.2.2. Support involvement of diverse and representative consumers and communities across all stages of health and medical research.
• 1.2.3. Increase effective consumer and community involvement in priority setting, designing funding schemes, and peer review across NHMRC grant schemes, supported by strengthened consumer and community involvement requirements.

Targets:

• 1.3.1. Increase philanthropic engagement and support for health and medical research.
• 1.3.2. Increase industry engagement and support for health and medical research through strategic collaboration.
• 1.3.3. Improve visibility and accessibility of information on research projects for industry and philanthropic organisations, including data on projects progressing proof-of-concept or early development.

Targets:

• 1.4.1. Increase NHMRC’s international collaborative reach through strategic partnerships that accelerate research and knowledge translation and strengthen Indigenous health and wellbeing research.

Targets:

• 1.5.1. Ensure research agendas reflect what matters most to those directly affected through priority setting workshops.

Priority 2 – Increased capability for impactful research translation and commercialisation

Targets:

• 2.1.1. Transform NHMRC funding models to drive research and knowledge translation into policy and practice, promote commercialisation and industry collaboration; align with MRFF and other government initiatives; and minimise duplication and gaps across the discovery to impact pathway.
• 2.1.2. Ensure diverse research backgrounds and experiences are appropriately recognised in assessment criteria (e.g. clinicians and community-based researchers).
• 2.1.3. Create targeted opportunities for workforce entry, and build and strengthen capacity and capability of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health researchers, including through Aboriginal community-controlled health organisations.
• 2.1.4. Implement initiatives that build capacity and capability in research translation in RRR settings.
• 2.1.5. Ensure appropriate expertise in translational research (e.g. clinical, implementation, health economics, indigenous governance, commercialisation) across assessments of grant schemes.

Targets:

• 2.2.1. Support NHMRC’s Research Translation Centres through accreditation and funding to embed health service-led research and drive HSR culture, translation and impact.
• 2.2.2. Consider funding models that build capacity in HSR, including clinicians, health economists and implementation scientists.
• 2.2.3. Enhance grant assessment frameworks to ensure HSR is appropriately recognised and supported.
• 2.2.4. Identify better ways for monitoring and measuring NHMRC and MRFF funding for HSR.

Targets:

• 2.3.1. Develop and operationalise NHMRC capability and/or capacity to monitor and evaluate research impact on health, productivity and the economy.
• 2.3.2. Develop mechanisms to support consistent and transparent collection and reporting of key research outcomes across NHMRC/MRFF, strengthening public confidence, trust and understanding of the value and impact of health and medical research.
• 2.3.3. Explore and analyse external datasets (e.g. patents, regulated products) to report on NHMRC’s contribution to research translation and commercialisation.
• 2.3.4. Ensure NHMRC’s strategies, policies and practices uphold and protect the principles Indigenous data sovereignty and governance, while ensuring the responsible management and sharing of research data to promote transparency, collaboration, and ethical use.

Priority 3 – Equitable, high-quality, outcomes-focused and accessible research for public benefit

Targets:

• 3.1.1. Establish a systematic approach that clearly outlines NHMRC’s role and priorities in developing and disseminating evidence-based guidelines.
• 3.1.2. Support the development, endorsement, and dissemination of clinical practice, public and environmental health guidelines and advice, to support evidence-based prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care for the populations they serve.
• 3.1.3. Develop, publish and promote guidelines to support the responsible use of artificial intelligence in health and medical research, enhancing translation efficiency and public safety.
• 3.1.4. Scope the expansion of NHMRC’s capacity in evidence synthesis and guideline development, including more timely outcomes and the appropriate use of AI.
• 3.1.5. Establish a mechanism to identify areas of low value care and evidence-practice gaps.

Targets:

• 3.2.1. Implement activities aligned with NHMRC’s equity priorities and monitor subsequent translation outcomes by priority population group.

Targets:

• 3.3.1. Publish communications and case studies on online public platforms showcasing the support for, and outcomes of, NHMRC-funded health and medical research and highlighting NHMRC and MRFF collaboration to align funding mechanisms and maximise impact.

Targets:

• 3.4.1. Continue to support the NHMRC and MRFF Open Science Policy through communicating policy requirements and assessing compliance, enabling measurable improvements in accessible research outputs.