https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3997-1950
-
Views
-
Cite
Cite
James H Derzon, Heather L Menne, Implementation Science: An Approach for Evaluating Aging Policies and Services, Public Policy & Aging Report, Volume 32, Issue 1, 2022, Pages 31–35, https://doi.org/10.1093/ppar/prab031
Close - Share Icon Share
Extract
Despite the well-established and well-publicized effectiveness of coronavirus disease 2019 vaccinations in preventing hospitalizations, large swaths of the American public remain unvaccinated (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2021). Vaccinations in the United States follow the adoption curve common to the uptake of all policies and procedures and, for that matter, commercial products (Figure 1). Innovations, whether they are policies, evidence-based practices, or commercial products, all follow some variation of an adoption curve: a slow initial uptake, followed by an increase, followed by a leveling off that may or may not approach 100%. And lest we consider these adoption lags to be attributable to a lack of education, knowledge, or opportunity, note that fewer than half of clinical innovations in medicine make it into general usage, and those that do take 17 years or more to reach majority adoption (Balas & Boren, 2000; Morris et al., 2011). These adoption curves highlight a striking challenge for policy evaluation when policies to be implemented require adoption and implementation by organizations that exist in social, political, sociocultural, and other external or internal environments.
