New Pathways to Health Equity: How Implementation Science Can Lead Global Learning to Transform US Healthcare

The US healthcare system, despite its resources, faces persistent health inequities. Paradoxically, highly effective, community-centric innovations often emerge from resource-constrained low- and middle-income countries. This paper describes how the field of global learning can be an approach for translating these global insights into actionable strategies and that implementation science (IS) provides a methodology to guide the process. Two case studies are described as examples: (1) the adaptation of Community Health Worker best practices from Togo to the Bronx, New York, to address local health disparities; (2) the localized, integrated care model at Michigan’s Corner Health Center, which adopted principles from women’s groups in India. By applying an IS framework to global learning innovations, the US can effectively adapt proven global solutions to close domestic health gaps and foster a more resilient healthcare system.