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The EXTRA Program

The Executive Training for Research Application program or EXTRA (known in French as FORCES: Formation en utilisation de la recherche pour cadres qui exercent dans la santé) is one of the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation (CHSRF)'s flagship programs and is aimed at developing capacity and leadership to optimize the use of research evidence in managing Canadian healthcare organizations.

EXTRA gives health system managers across Canada the skills to better use research in their daily work, as a way to increase evidence-informed decision-making in the health system.

In line with its mandate to develop capacity in health services and policy research, the Ontario Training Centre in Health Services and Policy Research (OTC) entered in May 2004 into a partnership with the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation (CHSRF) to provide organizational and mentoring support for the Ontario component of the EXTRA program, thus becoming the Ontario Regional Mentoring Centre (RMC) for EXTRA.

The EXTRA program is offered through a partnership of the Canadian Health Services Research Foundation (CHSRF), the Canadian College of Health Leaders (CCHL), the Canadian Medical Association (CMA), the Canadian Nurses Association (CNA), and a consortium of Quebec partners, represented by the Institut national d’excellence en santé et en service sociaux (INESSS).

The new 14-month EXTRA Team Fellowships

These EXTRA Fellowships identify and support teams of healthcare executives in initiating and leading evidence-informed improvements in their own organizations, or across jurisdictions involving multi-site teams and cross-boundary Intervention Projects. These prestigious and competitive EXTRA fellowships are acknowledged for their contribution to building a cohort of healthcare leaders with the skills to use research strategically in order to lead innovation and generate significant improvements within the Canadian healthcare system.

Given the rapid evolution of reform within the system over the last decade, CHSRF and its EXTRA partners recognize the need to accelerate performance and quality improvement in Canada’s healthcare. This new 14-month Fellowship builds on the EXTRA program’s early work by increasing the supply of well-trained executives who are not only experienced in the use and application of evidence for improvement projects, but who are also trained in the initiation, implementation and sustaining of performance and quality activity that is so pivotal to improving health services in Canada.

EXTRA Fellowships provide an opportunity for healthcare leaders to acquire knowledge, skills, and competencies that will help them to:

  • use research-informed evidence with greater confidence in decision-making
  • design and implement a research-informed-change-management intervention of strategic importance to their organization
  •  build organizational and cross-jurisdictional capacity for research use in support of quality and performance improvement

EXTRA teams have the opportunity to:

  • acquire skills and knowledge to support improvement
  • learn effective techniques, leadership tactics and organizational strategies to initiate, manage and sustain improvement
  • use organizational research evidence, quality improvement theory and change management to support improvement
  • design and achieve measured progress on an organizational improvement initiative, or a multi-site improvement initiative across jurisdictions
  • implement effective and sustainable evidence-informed solutions that address organizational and regional health system priorities
  • collaborate and network with Canadian peers who possess improvement experience and skills

The Regional Mentoring Centres are the direct contact point for the Fellows-Mentors-Coaches relationships in the regions. Their role is to ensure that support is provided to EXTRA Fellows with the academic program and Intervention Projects (both in their design and implementation). In addition to the OTC as Ontario Regional Mentoring Centre, mentoring support is provided in other regions of Canada by the Atlantic Regional Training Centre (ARTC), Centre FERASI in Quebec, and the Western Regional Training Centre. The Ontario Regional Mentoring Centre Program Coordinator is Rhonda Cockerill (University of Toronto) with Miguel A. Pérez (OTC Program Manager) as EXTRA Program Assistant.

Through the OTC as the Ontario Regional Mentoring Centre, Fellows also get access to the wide OTC network of Principal Investigators (19) across the six OTC participating universities, graduates, students, and decision-makers.

Ontario participants in the EXTRA program to date have been 66: 9 Fellows from Cohort 1 (2004-2006), 6 Fellows from Cohort 2 (2005-2007), 7 Fellows from Cohort 3 (2006-2008), 5 Fellows from Cohort 4 (2007-2009), 18 Fellows from Cohort 5 (2008-2010), 8 Fellows from Cohort 6 (2009-2011), 6 Fellows from Cohort 7 (2010-2012), and 7 Fellows from the new Cohort 8 (2011-2013).  Fifty three Fellows have already completed the program (Cohorts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6).

For details on specific components of the program, select various bars on the left side panel.

For linkage to the CHSRF’s EXTRA Website, visit:

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