Comparative effectiveness research and patient-centered outcomes research are widely agreed to be a key strategy for improving the physical and economic health of the nation. Research on quality, safety and comparative effectiveness will provide the knowledge urgently needed to improve health outcomes and lower costs. A particular shortage of trained researchers in the areas of surgical, trauma, and urgent/emergency care quality, safety and comparative effectiveness research is made more pressing by the high impacts and costs of surgical and trauma care. None of the existing AHRQ-supported T32 programs specifically focus in these clinical domains. Therefore, the overall goal of the proposed UC Davis Quality, Safety, And Comparative Effectiveness Research Training (QSCERT) T32 program, led by Joy Melnikow, MD, MPH, is to establish a multidisciplinary, postdoctoral training program in quality, safety, and comparative effectiveness research with a particular emphasis on training researchers from all relevant disciplines in surgical, trauma, and urgent/ emergency care quality and outcomes. Given UC Davis' extensive research training and academic infrastructure, QSCERT has the capacity to nurture such a cadre of researchers. QSCERT will admit three postdoctoral fellows (MD or PhD) per year to participate in a two-year training program (in special circumstances, scholars may be recruited for one year). The QSCERT curriculum includes the core requirements of didactic training, career development training, and mentored research experience, with the option to earn a Master in Public Health (MPH) or Master in Advanced Study (MAS) degree. For didactic training, an effective array of courses and career development workshops have been chosen from established training programs to form the core QSCERT curriculum, providing scholars with the core competencies and in depth knowledge required for successful careers in quality, safety and comparative effectiveness research. For mentored training, scholars will be matched to a primary faculty mentor and a multidisciplinary mentorship team drawn from institutional Centers (the Center for Healthcare Policy and Research, Cancer Center, Center for Poverty Research, and the Institute of Population Health Improvement), the Departments of Medicine, Surgery, Emergency Medicine, and Public Health Sciences, and the Betty Irene School of Nursing. As home to one of the National Center for Research Resources' (NCRR) vanguard Clinical and Translational Science Centers, UC Davis has a strong track record in developing and maintaining interdisciplinary research programs. Through the Center for Healthcare Policy and Research, UC Davis has also built a prominent multidisciplinary research program in quality, safety, and CER, with a successful primary care faculty development program supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). We will leverage our experience and established infrastructure to create an interdisciplinary training program that will build our national capacity for research focused on improving health care outcomes for the American people.
To improve the nation's health, we need highly trained researchers who can evaluate the benefits and harms of different interventions to prevent, diagnose, treat, and monitor health, particularly those focused on surgical, trauma, and emergency medicine outcomes. This training grant will provide three scholars per year with research experience and didactic and career training so they have the capacity to become successful independent researchers whose work will improve health care outcomes for the American people.
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