2021 IHI Forum Call for Proposals
Deadline June 7, 2021
Please note: The IHI Forum is offering attendees the choice to participate in sessions in-person and virtually. We are looking for interactive, innovative session designs for both settings. If your session includes an activity that requires attendees to be together in a shared space or for another reason would not work well online, please select “in-person only.” If your session would be effective and engaging in a virtual setting, please select “in-person or virtual.”
Want to know how you can submit an abstract that has a higher chance of acceptance?
Here are a few tips and some guidelines to help you develop a strong proposal.
Proposals are more likely to be accepted if you:
1. Have a strong team teaching/presenting the content of the session. This includes:
- Have a strong team that includes interprofessional representation from various disciplines teaching/presenting the content of the session.
- Session presenters that currently work as a leader, health care professional, improvement practioner, community member or are patient and family members with lived experience.
- Session presenters who are not employed by a commercial, for-profit interest or working in private or consulting roles, and the tools, content and technology you are providing are non-proprietary and accessible to all.
2. Align the content of your session to what matters most to IHI Forum attendees:
- Ensure your session is relevant to a range of disciplines in health and health care (e.g., address the interprofessional team; include content and examples relevant to nurses, physicians, public health professionals, and community health leaders).
- Incorporate Improvement Science methods into your presentation.
- Meaningfully address equity in your proposal and session.
3. Make your session dynamic and useful to improvement work:
- Plan to teach and provide a tool, framework, roadmap, or resource that is freely accessible for participants and can be used for implementation.
- Include opportunities for discussion and interaction within the session.
- Address patient and family engagement or include a patient as a co-presenter.
- Include data when talking about results of your work (time series data reflected in run or control charts is preferred over bar or pie charts).
4. Follow all directions in the form when submitting abstract:
- Submit a thoughtful, error-free description of your session and on time (Late submissions and submissions that differ from the directions will not be considered).
- Complete all fields for consideration of your proposal. This includes all speakers, titles, credentials, affiliations, and a brief biography. If any fields are not completed your proposal will not be considered.
*Anyone selected to present at the Forum will be required to complete a comprehensive Presenter Disclosure form as part of IHI’s Accreditation policies and procedures. Further instructions will be sent after your proposal has been accepted.
Subject Matter Focus
The 9 large subject matter areas below represent priority areas for the Forum content. Select the subject matter area that most appropriately represents your presentation. Within each subject matter area you will have the opportunity to note subtopic areas that help the Forum reviewers review your proposal in further detail.
Based upon session submissions, the final the Forum program will be crafted into tracks that best meet the needs of Forum attendees according to the strongest submitted content.
Please note: your submission could be considered for an alternative subject matter area or a subtopic if the Forum Planning Committee feels your presentation better suits another category.
1. Addressing Value, Cost and Quality: Accelerating a health care organization’s ability to thrive in value-based care.
2. Equity: Improving systems changes to ensure everyone has the opportunity to attain their full health potential, including improving access, quality, and/or health and well-being outcomes with communities that have been systematically marginalized based on characteristics linked to discrimination or exclusion, and improving for all; naming racism and other forms of oppression/advantage, how they impact health outcomes and health care quality, and strategies to address.
3. Joy and Well Being in Work: Providing proven methods and resources to enable the workforce to truly thrive — not just persevere.
4. Leadership: Engaging leaders at all levels in driving results within health and health care.
5. Improvement Science: Applying the concepts, methods, and tools of improvement science to drive meaningful and far-reaching changes that measurably improve health and health care.
6. Person-Centered Care: Putting people, patients, and care partners at the heart of every decision and partnering with them to improve care.
7. Population Health: Improving the "health outcomes of a group of individuals, including the distribution of such outcomes within the group. These groups are often geographic populations such as nations or communities, but can also be other groups such as employees, ethnic groups, disabled persons, prisoners, or any other defined group.” (Kindig & Stoddard, N. Lewis). Sessions may be focused on work in sectors including maternal and child health, mental health and well-being, and beyond health care, as well as linkages and collaborations between sectors.
8. Patient Safety: Making the health care continuum safer by reducing harm and preventing mortality.
9. Covid-19: IHI has cultivated a list of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) subtopics that are emerging in response to this pandemic. IHI is looking for content related to this.
Session Format Guidelines for In-Person and Virtual
In-Person: Simulation, world cafe or fishbowl activity would be most effective when participants can physically be together and move around a room to interact. Similarly, a game or activity that requires materials (i.e. the Red Bead Game) wouldn't work as well in a virtual setting.
In-Person and/or Virtual: Didactic presentation, panel, debate, case study, ignite session/pecha kucha, flipped classroom, buzz session.
Looking for additional tips for crafting your proposal? Here's a few more:
Need help developing learning objectives?
https://teachonline.asu.edu/objectives-builder/
Looking for inspiring new session format ideas?
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/blog/formats-to-refresh-your-conference-ds00/
How to create a run chart?
Why is a run chart important?
http://www.ihi.org/resources/Pages/Tools/RunChart.aspx
We appreciate the time and effort you spend in crafting your session proposals. We receive hundreds of highly competitive submissions and the content of our conference is informed by participant needs assessment.