Whither clinical research?

Abstract

Most neurologic laboratory scientists are concerned with disease states in patients, and many use patient tissues or fluids for research on mechanisms of disease. Their research would appropriately be called clinical research. Several years of training and mentorship are required before such investigators are successful at obtaining independent NIH grant support. There is another type of clinical research that involves but is not limited to outcomes research, treatment trials, and technology assessment. The perception of lack of recognition and lack of funding for this type of clinical research is the primary focus of Status of Clinical Research in Neurology, a report by the Clinical Research Subcommittee of the American Academy of Neurology published in this issue of Neurology. It documents the current status of such clinical research in neurology departments across the country. While most neurology training programs in the United States have been quite successful in producing neurologists with superior clinical and technical skills, we have generally assumed that such training was also sufficient to conduct research on patients with neurologic disease. No one would expect a laboratory scientist, either MD or PhD, to initiate a research program without training, but we seem to expect that academically oriented clinicians outside the laboratory must master the …