Service Blueprints: Can they Help Ensure the Ideals of Residential Services are not “Lost in Translation”?

Abstract

This article asks: What kind of blueprint would be helpful to translating diverse research evidence into residential services? One possible answer is explored with reference to the practical task of designing a blueprint for a statewide adolescent residential service for addiction in Australia. The article describes the blueprint using a typology of the key features of the ideal service that it models. These aim to help practitioners and policymakers see how to create the different interacting parts of a three-dimensional service based on a learning ethos.

KEYWORDS:

• translational research
• adolescent residential services
• addiction services

The project was a University Department of Rural Health consultancy commissioned by The Salvation Army, and funded by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing Illicit Drug Diversion Initiative and the Tasmanian Department of Health and Human Services. The author would like to acknowledge the valuable contributions of the project reference group.