The Trustee for the HCF Research FoundationRegistered

Our mission to improve health and wellbeing outcomes through health services research has continued to expand our focus on supporting innovative, translatable research, and the implementation of evidencebased models of care into practice. By developing new grant schemes and encouraging applicants to embed translation and implementation approaches into their projects from the beginning, we are now seeing grants reporting changes in clinical practice and patient outcomes well ahead of completion. These positive impacts include increasing guidelineconcordant care, reducing readmissions and presentations to emergency departments, improving wellbeing and freeing up valuable resources in an overstretched health system. This year, a total of eight projects were awarded grants through the HCF Research Foundation s main funding streams. These projects cover a wide breadth of topics, including primary care support of preventive and population health, the use of AI and big data in healthcare decision making, nondrug innovations in pain management, and optimising the healthcare workforce to improve patient outcomes and experiences. Each of these projects has the potential to significantly change lives. In addition to getting these exciting new projects underway, our overall partnership network continues to expand rapidly. Since 2021, when a revised strategy was implemented, 30 new projects have commenced across a network of almost 150 partner institutions including universities, research institutes, hospitals, health districts, primary health networks, associations and aged care providers. This is an extraordinary footprint for the HCF Research Foundation across the healthcare spectrum. Broader communication and showcasing of our wonderful research projects and their outcomes remains a key activity, through our webinar series, conferences, media and directly to our members through the Health Agenda newsletter. By raising the profile of our funded research outcomes among our members, the public and other key health stakeholders, we hope to further the dissemination and uptake of more efficient, highquality and highvalue healthcare, and make it more accessible to all Australians. Further details about the various streams of the grant programs run by HCF Research Foundation during FY24 can be viewed in the HCF Research Foundation Year in Review Financial Year 20232024 document here: https://www.hcf.com.au/aboutus/ hcffoundation/hcffoundationabout/hcffoundationreports