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Weekly UpdatesIntroduction
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), the predominant funding agency for biomedical research in the United States, was allocated $29.24 billion for its fiscal year 2007 budget, an inflation-adjusted decrease of 1.2% from the previous year (National Institutes of Health, 2007). At the same time, NIH expects the number of grant proposals to increase by 6.5% in 2007 (Zerhouni, 2006). This is compounded by the decline in success rates for new NIH R01 research grants from about 25% in 1998 to 16.3% in 2006 (NIH, n.d.). At the same time, many academic institutions are attempting to increase federal research grant funding. For smaller, less research-intensive institutions, the situation is even more challenging if they are to compete with their more research-intensive counterparts.
Funding decisions at NIH are based primarily on the critiques provided by the reviewers who serve on study sections. While this system is necessary to ensure that only the best and most worthy proposals are funded, it can be a slow process. With the Roadmap program, NIH is streamlining the application process and encouraging more applicants by revising the review criteria, transitioning to the electronic grant application system and introducing a new award mechanism targeted toward beginning investigators (NIH, 2004, NIH, 2006 & NIH, n.d.). Despite these efforts, the average turnaround time between grant submission and receipt of scores and reviews is still five to seven months (NIH, n.d.). Typically, NIH grant programs permit a maximum of two resubmissions. Because the overwhelming majority of new proposals do not get funded during the first review cycle, it is not uncommon for applicants to spend up to two years revising and resubmitting their proposals before receiving a final decision on funding. In the absence of sufficient institutional support, this time lapse can significantly hinder a research project.
Sufficient preliminary data to demonstrate the feasibility of the applicant's hypothesis is one of the key factors that increase reviewers' enthusiasm for a grant proposal. In a proverbial Catch-22, however, limited resources can delay or prevent the generation of preliminary data required for a successful proposal. Hence, it would be helpful to have a targeted source of funding for a promising proposal that may not be funded in the first submission.
This article describes a novel competitive grant program that we believe can help address some of the problems discussed above. Faculty compete for $20,000 awards by submitting NIH research grant proposals for internal review. Our program is intended to increase both the quantity and quality of grant proposals submitted to NIH and to provide incentives to enhance chances of funding in a timely manner. Similar programs can be adapted and further customized to meet the needs and objectives of individual institutions.
The Program at OU-COM
The Office of Research and Grants at the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine (OU-COM) initiated a program to stimulate the submission of competitive NIH proposals. The aim of this new mechanism is to support selected faculty in continuing their research and gathering more preliminary data while their proposals are under review.
Participating faculty are required to complete a full research grant proposal using the NIH application format. These proposals are then sent to qualified external reviewers from across the nation. Reviewers are recruited with not only the necessary expertise in the scientific area of the grant proposal, but also with a track record of NIH funding and experience with the N1H review system. The reviewers, who are paid a modest honorarium, are instructed to critique the proposals based on NIH's standard review criteria and to assign a priority score, lust as they would do as part of an NIH study section. The call for proposals is sent to faculty during the summer (July/August), with milestones and deadlines set in such a way that the applicant will be able to complete a significantly revised version of the proposal for submission to NIH during the February/March cycle of the following year.
Based on the critiques provided by the external reviewers, an internal panel of NIH-funded faculty members at Ohio University recommends up to three proposals for $20,000 awards, using funds allocated by the College. Because this award is restricted to OU-COM's faculty members, any potential conflicts of interest were minimized by recruiting panel members from outside the college. The $20,000 awards, coupled with the prospect of receiving expert reviews prior to submission to NIH, provide a strong incentive for faculty members to take part in the program.
When the competition was initiated in 2005, eight applications were received, of which three were selected for the internal award. Of these three, two proposals received respectable priority scores at NIH (160-175 range), but were not funded and one was unscored, ranking in the bottom half of the applications.
In 2006, the number of applications increased to 12, and two were selected for the award. These applications were revised and submitted to NIH for grant deadlines in early 2007; NIH review of these proposals is pending. We strongly encourage the faculty who did not receive internal college funding to use the reviewers' critiques to strengthen their proposals prior to submission to NIH.
Discussion
More and more faculty at smaller academic institutions are abandoning efforts to secure federal research funding because of increased teaching loads, stark competition for an ever-diminishing pool of grant monies, and lack of resources to generate the strong preliminary data required to produce competitive grant proposals. It is, therefore, important to provide assistance and incentives to faculty, so they can focus and refine their research efforts, and increase their chances for success in securing external research grant funding. Institutions faced with this situation may be well-advised to consider a competitive internal grant program, such as the one described here.
Why is this Program Important for Research Offices and Administrators?
The basic concept of internal grant funding opportunities to help investigators garner preliminary data is not unique. Many universities and medical schools (including University of Iowa Medical School, University of Minnesota Medical School, Georgia State University, University of Mississippi, Auburn University and University of Texas) have similar programs. However, there are certain important distinctions between existing programs and OU-COM's. The key innovations of our program are: (a) by mirroring NIH's requirements, duplication of efforts during grant submission is avoided, making the grant review and submission process more efficient for both the research office and the researcher; (b) of the internal funding mechanisms that were identified, none had a requirement of an external grant submission tied to the program, nor did the proposals go through a rigorous external review process; and, (c) the scope of many of these funding mechanisms was limited, e.g., some were restricted to a particular research topic or to junior faculty members.
Additionally, our experience shows that there are a few overarching advantages to conducting such a program:
1. Opportunity for mentoring and education: One of the primary functions of research/ grant offices is to educate and mentor investigators in grant submission and compliance with sponsors' regulatory, scientific and administrative requirements. A competitive grant program can serve as a good "dry run" for novice investigators who do not have significant NIH grant writing experience. This allows them to experience all of the elements of the grant application process--preparing biosketches, formulating a budget, following the sponsor's guidelines, assembling the various sections of the grant, honing writing and communication skills, and developing proficiency in using the electronic grant application system. Finally, the reviewers' critiques are also a key part of this education because they examine the soundness and value of the fundamental hypotheses, and the aims and methods of the project.
2. Reduced review turnaround time and greater efficiency: The elapsed time between proposal submission and applicants' receipt of critiques from external reviewers through this program was only two months, which is a 60-70% reduction in the average review time at NIH. The program is designed so that proposals can be revised based upon the reviews received in December and submitted to NIH for the February/March deadline dates.
3. Improvement in quantity and quality of proposals: A competitive grant program, coupled with institutional expectations, can provide the necessary incentive for faculty to apply for more grants (quantity). With critiques from qualified and experienced reviewers, faculty can revise their proposals prior to submission for external funding and greatly improve their chances of funding by submitting a better proposal (quality).
4. The "fourth strike": Many funding agencies have restrictions on the number of times an application can be submitted. At NIH, a research grant application can be revised only twice. If the application is unsuccessful after three attempts, NIH requires applicants to submit a new grant (making major changes in specific aims and research plans) for future applications. Given NIH's "three-strike" system, this grant competition program provides one additional review cycle (the "fourth strike") to improve the chances of funding.
5. Resources to advance the research project: Participants who receive $20,000 awards through the grant competition are able to advance their projects and gather more preliminary data, serving to jumpstart the project if funded by NIH or further strengthen a resubmission if the proposal is not funded. For example, one of the researchers selected for the award was able to obtain enough preliminary data (using the awarded funds) to publish the results in a peer-reviewed publication, thus further strengthening his NIH grant application.
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