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Table 4 Facilitation/CRCs’ roles in knowledge translation activities

From: Clinical research coordinators’ role in knowledge translation activities in rehabilitation: a mixed methods study

Level

Strategies/mechanisms

Subcategories

Representative quotations

Facilitation

Role as translator, mediator, transmission belt, gatekeeper, knowledge broker (e.g. a translator for the clinical teams of the functioning of the academic world and the clinical realities; an intermediary to ensure a common language between researchers and managers (mediator role); a transmission belt of knowledge between the key actors, i.e., clinical knowledge and experiential knowledge)

Information manager: Knowledge diffusion and dissemination (e.g. conferences during the lunchtime, websites, community of practice

"I think our role so far, because of lack of resources, is mainly diffusion—it's passive. There is no real integration of knowledge" (# CRC 1)

"…We have a calendar that is more structured, it's every three months, I think? Anyway, which is quarterly and with lots of activities that are varied, that reach out to diverse audiences qualitatively and probably quantitatively…. researchers, students who are the carriers of these activities of scientific animation, but it remains that the target public also, it is very varied that it is students, researchers, partners, users…Even if we organize conferences during the lunch time, there's always an opening for other activities." (# CRC 2)

"It's something that we have a lot of time to do. It's pretty easy to organize a conference, we don't have much to do …." (# CRC 3)

"… Helping them write the application, prepare the poster, submit the abstract to the symposium. Just thinking about the project, itself or the presentation, structuring the ideas" (# CRC 1)

Role as translator, mediator, transmission belt, gatekeeper, knowledge broker (e.g. a translator for the clinical teams of the functioning of the academic world and the clinical realities; an intermediary to ensure a common language between researchers and managers (mediator role); a transmission belt of knowledge between the key actors, i.e., clinical knowledge and experiential knowledge)

Information manager: Assessing and synthetizing information (e.g. summary or synthesis of knowledge in clear, simple and concise language targeting clinical teams disseminated electronically, web-page)

."Writing of a newsletter (10 times a year);

Feeding the research Web pages;

Writing of the annual report on research activities;

Support to a community of practice of clinicians

Support for the development of research projects

Support for publication by clinical teams (posters, presentations)

Responding to ministerial mandates.". (#CRCs 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9)

"The transfer of knowledge begins the moment a project is presented to a manager, so it takes a certain amount of accompaniment so that everyone can speak the same language, and I have often found that the manager did not fully understand the project, so I had to organize a meeting with the researcher, or at least arrange for them to speak together. So that's what I think is central to my role." (# CRC 6)

"The academic affairs department had a meeting with the researchers (…) to find out what the main obstacle was…. And then one of the things that came up was the common language, a lack of common language. It's really, not only that they have two different realities or two different rhythms, clinical and research, they don't speak the same language at all." (# CRC 1)

Role as translator, mediator, transmission belt, gatekeeper, knowledge broker (e.g. a translator for the clinical teams of the functioning of the academic world and the clinical realities; an intermediary to ensure a common language between researchers and managers (mediator role); a transmission belt of knowledge between the key actors, i.e., clinical knowledge and experiential knowledge)

Information manager: Providing resources (e.g. scanning of relevant information such as articles, evidence-based papers, or useful websites; marketing of research articles for the implications at their local context; Assisting clinical teams in the writing of a paper or the creation of their materials such as posters or oral presentations at local, national, and international

"We have a marketing role. Projects like that that are less sexy, or …. it doesn't fit as well, and then you must sell it, so we have a certain loyalty to our researchers, a loyalty to the institution means that (…) that's one of the difficulties we have too." (# CRC 1)

Facilitator: Centralization of requests from research teams targeting the clinical teams; Coordination of projects; Organization of KT activities coordinated with and for the clinical program, e.g., presentation of ongoing projects to clinical teams; Organization of informal meetings

"The best triangle is the research knowledge, the organizational knowledge and the experiential knowledge. My role is to circulate as much of this knowledge as possible…I know that clinicians are interested in research, but research is interested in clinicians. (# CRC 5)

Linkage agent and capacity builder: Sensitize the research team to the clinical context in which the project is taking place; Encourage to having a member of the clinical team of the targeted program on the research team and increasing the matching and the connections; Raise awareness’ research team on knowledge transfer strategies that can be carried out in synergy with clinical needs and realities)

"We are actually called CRC, but we could be called knowledge brokers too" (# CRC 9)

"The linkage … is between the two, but we are very useful for that, to make…any project to be possible" (# CRC 8)

"Actually, I also see our role as an intermediary, as someone who also comes…" (# CRC 2)

"We are in the middle, we are translators of both languages. Translation of everyone's realities, translation of everyone's objectives, interests, motivations… we are there." (# CRC 1)