Pakistan Workshop 2023

Nurse-led co-design methodology for developing community health nursing interventions

Two face to face workshops

Workshop information

The purpose of these workshops is to enhance the research capacity of nurses in Pakistan through a co-design process. This approach focuses on social democracy, equity, identifying and understanding problems, and finding mutually agreed solutions for the benefits of the end-users. The co-design process involves active engagement of the community and all stakeholders to explore problems, identify priorities, ideate, and finalize locally acceptable solutions tailored to the local needs. The involvement of community and stakeholders is crucial for the success of any population-based intervention program, and interventions designed through co-design have better acceptance among end-users and are easily implementable with little input from outsiders.

The workshop will use the five stages of the design thinking model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford to guide the co-design process. The first stage, Empathise, involves understanding the problem and conducting need assessments through both quantitative and qualitative research, developing rapport with the community, and engaging with local stakeholders. In the Define stage, empathy is unpacked into needs and insights to derive an actionable problem statement, and data analysis is used to inspire the ideation process. Ideate is the stage where the team generates "radical design" alternatives to explore a wide range of solutions. The Prototype stage involves developing a single mature intervention prototype required for testing or implementation phase, while the Test stage involves implementing the designed intervention in the target population and its evaluation.

By following this co-design process, nurses in Pakistan will be equipped with research skills and a deep understanding of the problems faced by their communities. The interventions developed through this process will be locally relevant and sustainable, with better acceptance among end-users. This workshop will promote community engagement, foster partnerships with local stakeholders, and ultimately contribute to improving the health outcomes of Pakistan's population.

Background to the workshop:
A co-design process being widely used these days, work on the principles of social democracy, equity, identifying and understanding problems and finding mutually agreed solutions with and for the benefits of the end users. It involves active engagement of the community and all stakeholders starting from exploring problems, identifying priorities, ideating, and finalizing locally acceptable solutions tailored to the local needs and implementing those solutions with and for the people for whom it is designed. Meaningful and active involvement of community and stakeholders is important for the success of any population-based intervention program. Interventions designed through co-design approach has better acceptance among the end-users, can be easily implemented anywhere with little input from the outsiders, and with the involvement of local stakeholders, long term sustainability is possible. A co-design methodology involves five stages of design thinking model proposed by the Hasso-Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford will be used to guide this workshop. The five stages include: Empathise, Define, Ideate, Prototype and test. A brief description of each stage is provided below.

Empathise:
Empathy is necessary to understand the problem (what the beneficiaries think and feel— what they need) so that it could be solved more completely. This stage also involves developing rapport with the community and strong engagement with local stakeholders. In this stage,both quantitative and qualitative research can be conducted to perform need assessment.

Define:
This stage is where we unpack empathy into needs and insights and derive an actionable problem statement. In this stage, we analyse the data, and our findings inspire us to take the ideation process. Participants are asked to draw a self-portrait and to briefly describe what aspects of their experiences and strengths could be considered relevant to meet the problems identified. This stage can also be used for priority setting.

Ideation:
Ideate is the mode and ideation are a process where within the context of the problem statement, the team generates “radical design” alternative. The goal of ideation is to explore a wide solution. In this process, we allow our self in divergent thinking (brainstorming and mind-mapping exercises) followed by convergent thinking to synthesize (i.e., refine and integrate) collections of ideas into a cohesive viable concept. The interventions developed at this stage are guided with evidence and theory of change or action.

Prototype:
The objective of this stage is to initiate evaluation, reflection, and learning and, typically to develop a single mature intervention prototype required for testing or implementation phase.

Test:
This phase involves the implementation of the designed intervention in the target population and its evaluation. The test mode is iterative modes where there is abundant space to gather feedback, refine solutions, and continue to learn about our users.