The purpose of this NIH K30 competitive renewal application is to support and expand the clinical research curriculum at the University of Colorado Health Science Center (UCHSC). This curriculum is a component of the Clinical Science Degree Program at UCHSC. We propose to improve the quality of instruction in the existing UCHSC Clinical Science curriculum and support expansion to include training in the quickly evolving field of health information technology. The UCHSC Clinical Science Program directors are nationally recognized as leaders for planning, directing, and executing high quality, rigorous courses and research project experiences for clinical science training. The UCHSC Clinical Science Program includes both a Certificate program for clinical investigations completing 22 hours of advanced course work and a Ph.D. in Clinical Science requiring of two years of didactic course work followed by a thesis based on clinical investigation. Both the Certificate and the PhD Programs were developed over the past six years and have documented exceptional student achievements (for both publication in the peer-reviewed literature and extramural funding), high-level enrollment and timely completion rates. The UCHSC Clinical Science Program has two tracks: Clinical Investigation and Health Services Research. The goal of this competitive K30 renewal application, therefore, is to maintain and improve the existing didactic curriculum and to substantively expand this current curriculum by adding new bioinformatics-related coursework. In addition, student research project mentorship will be improved and expanded by adding UCHSC Graduate School information systems and biotechnology faculty to our program and creating new bioinformatics support for these clinical investigators.
