Scaling Up: Implementing Interventions on a Larger Scale 

After countless hours of research and collaboration, successfully impacting your target audience with an intervention you’re passionate about feels like a monumental accomplishment. 

But what’s next? 

Think big — as in scaling up to help a much larger population. While you may encounter obstacles along the way, the potential benefits are often worth it. Join us as we explore some of the common challenges and opportunities associated with implementing interventions on a larger scale. 

Scaling Interventions: How It Works 

Before a small-scale intervention is expanded, it typically meets several criteria, such as: 

• Acceptance by both providers and recipients of the intervention. 

• Adaptability in different contexts. 

• Demonstrable positive impacts on health outcomes in the target population. 

• Active stakeholder engagement to ensure buy-in during the expansion. 

Once an intervention meets these or other agreed-upon criteria, stakeholders may decide to broaden its scope, implementing it across multiple regions, organizations or populations. This increases its reach and impact. 

However, scaling up requires a range of additional resources, including: 

• Funding for expansion 

• Additional personnel to manage the implementation in new locations 

• Expanded technology and infrastructure  

• Rigorous training for staff  

• Monitoring and evaluation systems to track outcomes and progress 

• Ongoing stakeholder engagement to provide support, resources and insights 

Challenges of Implementing on a Larger Scale 

How wonderful it would be if you could simply sign off on a successful small-scale intervention and instantly roll it out across the United States or even worldwide. Unfortunately, it’s not typically that simple. 

Before scaling up an intervention, there are several challenges you may need to address. For example, imagine your team has successfully implemented a new telemedicine platform in several rural towns. While you and your stakeholders are eager to expand its reach, you may encounter the following obstacles: 

• Resource constraints 
  Scaling up means you’ll likely require significantly more investment in areas like marketing and infrastructure. You’ll also need experienced staff members who can successfully lead teams of qualified personnel in multiple locations, including IT specialists and healthcare professionals trained in telemedicine. 

• Organizational resistance 
  While many stakeholders might have jumped on the bandwagon during your small-scale implementation, not everyone may feel as enthused to incorporate it on a larger scale. For example, some physicians may prefer in-person consultations and resist adopting the telemedicine platform, even if it benefits their patients and practice. 

• Barriers to technology 
  Many interventions rely on various types of technology to ensure their success. However, integrating your technology with existing systems, such as electronic health records (EHRs), isn’t always a seamless process, even with the help of experienced IT experts. Additionally, if your technology is newly developed, it may not be ready to immediately scale up. 

• Compliance issues 
  The regulations in the rural communities where you first implemented your telemedicine platform are probably significantly different from healthcare regulations in other cities and states. Before expanding, you’ll need to conduct extensive research to ensure you’re adhering to the laws in the areas you plan to reach. 

Opportunities in Large-Scale Implementation 

With every challenge comes an opportunity for advancement. Once you’ve overcome potential hurdles standing in the way of expanding your intervention, several benefits could arise from a broader implementation: 

• Increased reach 
  One of the more obvious, yet still notable, opportunities in scaling your intervention is the ability to offer your practice to more people. Once in motion, the implementation can provide consistent care to a larger audience, improving public health outcomes. 

• Attracting investments 
  Investors are more likely to support healthcare opportunities that have demonstrated success. As your platform expands, it may gain recognition, increasing the odds of attracting possible investors.  

• System-wide improvements 
  Scaling up your practice can lead to larger changes in the current healthcare system. It could also drive modernization and updates of existing policies and practices in the healthcare industry. 

Expand the Latest Implementations With an Online Graduate Certificate 

From the eradication of smallpox to the widespread availability of antiviral therapy for HIV/AIDS, the most well-known large-scale interventions began on a much smaller scale. With a greater understanding of how to successfully expand recent evidence-based practices, you could be one of the pioneers at the forefront of the next high-profile intervention of our lifetime. 

At the University of Florida, we offer an entirely online Graduate Certificate in Implementation Science. In as little as a year, you can complete our 11-credit online program, gaining the fundamental skills needed to advance in this quickly growing industry. 

Our program offers: 

• Affordable tuition rates 

• No GRE requirement 

• Flexibility to complete coursework 24/7 

• A credential from one of U.S. News & World Report’s top 50 national universities 

Are you ready to make a dramatic change in the healthcare of communities in need? Make the first move in your journey — apply today! 

Sources: 
https://implementationscience.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13012-016-0374-x
https://www.health.nsw.gov.au/research/Pages/scalability-guide-alt.aspx