The past decade has witnessed a dwindling number of physician scientists who pursue clinical research careers in the mental health arena and a high dropout rate among those who do. This proposal will continue a three-year collaboration between the University of Pittsburgh and Stanford University for the successful series of annual Research Career Development Institutes (CDI) for a broad-based group of promising junior physicians and PhDs, particularly women, minorities, and those from relatively less research-intensive departments of psychiatry, in order to provide necessary skills and support to have successful research careers in academic psychiatry. The focus of the curriculum will be on establishing and maintaining long- term relationships between these nascent researchers, their peers, and successful faculty researchers. The specific objectives of the proposal are to: 1) continue the annual meeting for young physicians for the next four years;2) implement a comprehensive mentoring program to establish and maintain long-term relationships between participants, peers, and mentors through regular telephone conference calls, a model Web site for training activities, annual booster sessions, and ongoing evaluation of participants'progress towards pre-established career objectives;and 3) continue the External Advisory Board that will oversee a careful evaluation of the program, augment minority recruitment, expand participants'subspecialty expertise, and participate in mentoring activities. The annual four-day institute, with 19 new participants each year, will alternate between the University of Pittsburgh and Stanford University. In addition to continuing the annual institute and booster sessions which provide workshops on key academic research survival skills, the next four years will focus on: 1) developing a mentoring network which will be made up of faculty from the home institution, other universities, institute faculty, and External Advisory Board members;and 2) insuring that CDI participants obtain support at their home institutions to sustain the momentum created by a CDI by establishing a national network of communicative support to heighten the visibility of new research training efforts, to share approaches that are effective at individual institutions, and to allow participants to maintain their own collaborations. A thorough long-term evaluation system to objectively assess the results of these training efforts will be conducted to track participants'progress toward grant funding, publications, promotions, and achievement of individual career goals for the duration of the grant period.
| O'Hara, Ruth; Cassidy-Eagle, Erin L; Beaudreau, Sherry A et al. (2010) Increasing the ranks of academic researchers in mental health: a multisite approach to postdoctoral fellowship training. Acad Med 85:41-7 |
| Kupfer, David J; Schatzberg, Alan F; Grochocinski, Victoria J et al. (2009) The Career Development Institute for Psychiatry: an innovative, longitudinal program for physician-scientists. Acad Psychiatry 33:313-8 |
