Effective Strategies for Changing Physicians' Behavior: Insights from Research on Diffusion of Innovations

The design and testing of new models for improving the quality of dementia care should draw on the broader literature on diffusion of innovations in health care and other settings, and knowledge about types of strategies likely to be effective in changing physician and health care organizational practices around care for dementia. At the individual physician level, such strategies should be interactive and employ social influence-based methods like opinion leaders, academic detailing, study groups, and others. It is likely that for a complex and chronic condition like dementia, much of the emphasis on improving care should target creation, testing, and replication of effective models for delivering care within different health care organizations.