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Transitions and Boundaries in the Coordination and Reform of Health Services pp 243–267Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

The Chain of Codified Knowledge: Organisational Enactment of Evidence-Based Health Care in Four High-Income Countries

Part of the Organizational Behaviour in Healthcare book series (OBHC)

Abstract

Kislov and colleagues draw on multiple qualitative case studies of evidence-based nursing conducted in Sweden, Canada, Australia and the UK to describe the chain of codified knowledge which reflects the institutionalisation of evidence-based practice as organisational “business as usual”. This chain is dominated by performance standards, policies and procedures and locally collected data, i.e. various forms of “evidence by proxy” which are, at best, informed by research only partly or indirectly, but are nevertheless perceived as credible evidence. This chapter reveals dual effects of this codification dynamic on evidence-based practice and highlights the influence of macro-level ideological, historical and technological factors on the composition and circulation of codified knowledge. It concludes by outlining the practical implications of the study for change agency in health-care reform.

Keywords

  • Evidence-based health care
  • Clinical guidelines
  • Research evidence
  • Codified knowledge
  • Codification
  • Cross-country analysis

The reworked and expanded version of this chapter was published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of The American Society for Public Administration as: Kislov, R., Wilson, P., Cummings, G., Ehrenberg, A., Gifford, W., Kelly, J., Kitson, A., Pettersson, L., Wallin, L., and Harvey, G. (2019). From research evidence to “evidence by proxy”? Organisational enactment of evidence-based health care in four high-income countries. Public Administration Review, 79(5), 684–698. https://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13056.

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Fig. 11.1

(Adapted from Kislov et al. 2019)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Alliance Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

    Roman Kislov & Paul Wilson

  2. University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB, Canada

    Greta Cummings

  3. School of Education, Health and Social Studies, Dalarna University, Borlänge, Sweden

    Anna Ehrenberg, Lena Pettersson & Lars Wallin

  4. School of Nursing, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Wendy Gifford

  5. Adelaide Nursing School, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA, Australia

    Janet Kelly & Gill Harvey

  6. Adelaide College of Nursing and Health Sciences, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA, Australia

    Alison Kitson

Authors
  1. Roman Kislov
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  2. Paul Wilson
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  3. Greta Cummings
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  4. Anna Ehrenberg
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  5. Wendy Gifford
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  6. Janet Kelly
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  7. Alison Kitson
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  8. Lena Pettersson
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  9. Lars Wallin
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  10. Gill Harvey
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Roman Kislov .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Health Sciences Education, McGill University, Montréal, QC, Canada

    Peter Nugus

  2. Department of Family Medicine, McGill University, Montréal, QC, Canada

    Charo Rodriguez

  3. School of Public Health, University of Montreal, Montréal, QC, Canada

    Jean-Louis Denis

  4. Department of Human Resource Management, HEC Montréal, Montréal, QC, Canada

    Denis Chênevert

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Kislov, R. et al. (2020). The Chain of Codified Knowledge: Organisational Enactment of Evidence-Based Health Care in Four High-Income Countries. In: Nugus, P., Rodriguez, C., Denis, JL., Chênevert, D. (eds) Transitions and Boundaries in the Coordination and Reform of Health Services. Organizational Behaviour in Healthcare. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26684-4_11

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