What? Primary health care reform has included the implementation of organizational system changes to support the integration of care across health care settings, particularly for patients with chronic health conditions. These reforms have met with some success, however, providers and patients continue to report challenges and gaps related to achieving effective coordinated and comprehensive care.

Why? The overall goal of this research is to review and synthesize the available research evidence in order to determine the characteristics of services and programs that optimize integration of care and good outcomes for persons with chronic conditions.

How? To address this goal, we are conducting a systematic review of the literature and will use a variety of techniques to synthesize and interpret the literature findings. We will identify the critical organizational attributes of integration strategies that are associated with good patient care.

Our research team, consisting of patient representatives, decision makers, knowledge users, and researchers will review and further interpret the synthesized findings within the context of current provincial performance frameworks.

Impact of findings: This research project will provide new information to support evidence-based primary health care planning and evaluation.