Documenting and communicating the contributions of embedded statisticians: Show me the value!

Abstract

Academic research productivity relies upon the contribution of statisticians, who are typically clustered in statistics and biostatistics departments, isolated from clinical researchers. Most academic health centres have created consultation hubs or research incubators to make statisticians available for individual collaboration to support the clinical research enterprise. Additionally, some clinical departments within academic health centres have recognized the value in colocating statisticians within their clinical departments to improve availability for collaboration with physicians/researchers. Embedded statisticians encounter the same challenges of isolated statisticians regarding professional support and networking, mentorship and clear role expectations. While for all collaborative statisticians, it is important to effectively communicate value to both collaborators and supervisors, this may be especially problematic for embedded statisticians in clinical departments where their supervisors may not have backgrounds in research or statistics. Previous papers have reported valuable metrics for statisticians, particularly those associated with Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Research Design Cores. There is a knowledge gap regarding metrics tailored to meet the needs of the embedded statistician and clinical supervisors. This paper is a first step towards addressing this important need.In this paper, we explore (1) the critical role of collaborative statisticians and the benefits and challenges of the embedded statistician model, (2) the need for additional metrics specific to embedded statisticians which measure value and (3) how to design a value report. We offer a framework for evaluation of the contributions of the embedded statistician with the following domains: (1) collaboration, (2) research output/productivity, (3) mentoring and (4) education. Metrics that are particularly specific to embedded statisticians and that are not routinely captured include time from project initiation to completion/outcome, time from initial statistical consultation to statistical outcome completion and summary of level of contribution for manuscripts and presentations in addition to author order. We conclude with thoughts on future directions for development of metrics and reporting systems for statisticians embedded in clinical departments.