In fiscal year 2004, an NIH Roadmap initiative provided nearly $8 million in funding to seven institutions to train researchers in multidisciplinary research — research involving teams of specialists from a variety of disciplines. In fiscal year 2005, five additional sites were funded. The twelve institutions, chosen because they have a strong clinical research infrastructure, will provide training to health professionals at the post-graduate level, such as those with an M.D., Ph.D., D.D.S., Pharm.D. or R.N.-Ph.D. With a total of twelve grants, this program is truly national in scope.

“A team approach is crucial for solving difficult medical problems that are too complex for scientists working in any single discipline to solve alone,” said Duane Alexander, M.D., Director of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and who, together with Robert Star, M.D., Senior Scientific Advisor at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, co-chairs the NIH Roadmap Trans-NIH Clinical Research Workforce Training Committee. “This award will help train the future leaders who can capitalize on the advances that team research will make possible.”

The Multidisciplinary Clinical Research Career Development Programs initiative of the NIH Roadmap is a key part of the Reengineering the Clinical Research Enterprise theme, which seeks to accelerate and strengthen the clinical research process. Specifically, this initiative is intended to produce new clinical research leaders who can cross the boundaries of their disciplines and draw upon the strengths of other fields. Clinical research includes epidemiologic and natural history studies, patient-oriented research, clinical trials, and outcomes research.

The grant awards support medical or public health institutions that can provide training for up to 15–20 health professionals at the post-graduate level. The trainees, known as clinical research (CR) scholars, come from a variety of fields such as medicine, dentistry, nursing, the behavioral sciences, biostatistics and epidemiology and will receive up to five years of training. The first phase of training consists of classroom instruction in how to design and conduct clinical research studies as part of a team of scientists encompassing several disciplines. During the second phase of their training, the CR scholars will design and take part in clinical research projects under the guidance of mentors who have extensive experience in conducting clinical research.

This initiative is unique, as it will provide training to all members of the clinical research team, including nurses, pharmacologists, biostatisticians and epidemiologists.

The twelve institutions to receive the award are:

• Case Western Reserve University/ Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Richard Rudick
• Johns Hopkins University, Neil Powe
• Mayo Clinic, Sherine Gabriel
• University of California, San Francisco, Steve Hulley
• University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Eugene Orringer
• University of Pittsburgh, Wishwa Kapoor
• University of Maryland Baltimore Professional School, Alan Shuldiner
• University of Minnesota, Russell Luepker
• University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Milton Packer
• University of Washington, Seattle, Richard Deyo
• University of Wisconsin, Madison, Mary Carnes
• Washington University, St. Louis, Victoria Fraser

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