Assessing the Organizational Climate for Translational Research with a New Survey Tool

Arno Simons,Martin Reinhart,Ulf Toelch,Lisa Liebenau,Jens Ambrasat,Stephanie Müller-Ohlraun,Ulrich Dirnagl,Barbara Hendriks,Nico Riedel

doi:10.1007/s11948-020-00234-0

Abstract

Promoting translational research as a means to overcoming chasms in the translation of knowledge through successive fields of research from basic science to public health impacts and back is a central challenge for research managers and policymakers. Organizational leaders need to assess baseline conditions, identify areas needing improvement, and to judge the impact of specific initiatives to sustain or improve translational research practices at their institutions. Currently, there is a lack of such an assessment tool addressing the specific context of translational biomedical research. To close this gap, we have developed a new survey for assessing the organizational climate for translational research. This self-assessment tool measures employees’ perceptions of translational research climate and underlying research practices in organizational environments and builds on the established Survey of Organizational Research Climate, assessing research integrity. Using this tool, we show that scientists at a large university hospital (Charité Berlin) perceive translation as a central and important component of their work. Importantly, local resources and direct support are main contributing factors for the practical implementation of translation into their own research practice. We identify and discuss potential leverage points for an improvement of research climate to foster successful translational research.

Highlights

Promoting the translation of knowledge through successive fields of research from basic science to public health impacts and back has become a central challenge for research managers and policymakers
Our results indicate that this Survey of Translational Research Climate (STRC), which still awaits proper validation, could be used as a self-assessment tool to assess employees’ perceptions of translational research climate and potentially underlying research practices and conditions in organizational environments
To assess the climate for translational research, we have developed a standardized questionnaire, modeled after the SOURCE, whose 18 items fall into two groups: a) six items assessing the organizational climate for translational research on the institutional level, b) twelve items assessing the organizational climate for translational research on the level of one’s immediate research environment

Summary

Introduction

Promoting the translation of knowledge through successive fields of research from basic science to public health impacts and back has become a central challenge for research managers and policymakers. One answer to this challenge is to support translational research, i.e. research that is oriented toward overcoming existing translational gaps (Drolet and Lorenzi 2011).. Being translational in one’s research means being oriented toward application in clinical contexts and the overall aim of improving human health while avoiding ‘research waste’ in the form of ignored, irrelevant or poorly designed or conducted research (Chalmers et al 2014; Ioannidis et al 2014). The activity of designing and conducting translational research is what we call translational research practices

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Conclusion