CTSAS AND FAMILY MEDICINE RESEARCH - TIME TO GET CONNECTED

Abstract

The window is closing on the opportunity for family medicine departments, working through our medical schools and universities, to be included in the 50 to 60 institutions funded by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) to transform the US clinical research infrastructure.1 NIH Clinical Translational Science Awards (CTSAs), designed for this purpose, have been awarded in the first 2 rounds (2006 and 2007) to 24 individual institutions and consortia.2 The third round of applications were due October 24, 2007. If 12 new CTSAs are awarded in the third and subsequent rounds, as was the case in each of the first 2 rounds, all of the planned CTSAs will have been awarded within the next 2 or 3 years. Family medicine has potentially much to offer and gain, given the CTSA emphasis on community engagement, practice-based research, and the agenda to “help deliver improved medical care to the entire population, helping to disseminate new technologies and new advances into clinical practice.”2 Maximizing family medicine involvement in CTSAs should help advance the NIH agenda and facilitate the maturation of the family medicine and larger primary care contribution to the national clinical research enterprise. Several Web sites and publications provide extensive context and background information on the CTSA program.1–3 The 24 current CTSA awardees as well as criteria for the award are listed on the CTSA Web site.2 A family medicine CTSA Strike Force is organizing communications, strategies and surveys to facilitate family medicine’s role.4 Several publications contributed by family medicine authors provide useful resources on translational research5–9 from a family medicine and primary care perspective. Our intent in this column is to describe current opportunities and strategies for family medicine involvement in CTSA programs. Thus far, family medicine representation has varied widely. A few departments have leadership roles within their institution, overseeing all research network and community engagement activities, and teaching researchers across the institutions the principles of practice and community-based research. Other departments play critical roles within several of these activities. Commonly, however, departments have been disengaged from the planning process, whether from lack of interest, or lack of invitation. Given the importance of the CTSA project and its level of funding, it is critical that all departments seek to engage, even if uninvited, and even if their institution is not actively seeking one of these highly competitive grants. There are several successful methods of engagement in the planning process. The simplest is to meet with the proposed principal investigator, who is often a bench researcher with little knowledge of practice-based or community research, and to describe the departments programs and connections, and how the department can help achieve the CTSA requirements. Sometimes, repeated discussions are needed; failed submissions with low scores on the community engagement section (which is required) can facilitate these interactions. It is important to note that consortia can submit for CTSA grants, and an increasing number of medical centers are doing so. The combination of a research intense medical school with 1 or more community-based schools can be a powerful and successful model. The NIH will be conducting a series of workshops on community engagement over the next year, which will provide additional opportunity for all departments, networks, and community partners to share and learn about this exciting and evolving field of clinical translational science. Thus, all FM departments will have an opportunity to participate in this national experiment and to help share the evolution of the NIH. The first national workshop is on “Accelerating the Translation of Research into Practice” and is scheduled for May 8–9 in Bethesda, Maryland. The first day’s topic is “Feasibility of Expanding and Integrating the Clinical Research Networks“ and the second is “Accelerating the Dissemination and Translation of Clinical Research into Practice.” In addition, a series of regional meetings on community and practice engagement are being planned, and will offer additional opportunities to showcase best practices and to learn from each other. Information of all of these meetings will be available on the NIH CTSA Web site (http://ctsaweb.org).