CTSA Program Publications

A robust biomedical informatics infrastructure is essential for academic health centers engaged in translational research. There are no templates for what such an infrastructure encompasses or how it is funded. An informatics workgroup within the Clinical and Translational Science Awards network conducted an analysis to identify the scope, governance, and funding of this infrastructure.

Background: In order to conduct translational science, scientists must combine domain specific expertise with knowledge on how to identify and cross translational hurdles and insights on positioning discoveries for the next translational stage.

Criteria for evaluating faculty are traditionally based on a triad of scholarship, teaching, and service. Research scholarship is often measured by first or senior authorship on peer-reviewed scientific publications and being principal investigator on extramural grants.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Roadmap for Medical Research initiative, funded by the NIH Common Fund and offered through the Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) program, developed more than 60 unique models for achieving the NIH goal of accelerating discoveries toward better public health.

The National Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) Consortium 2.0 has developed common metrics as a collaborative project for all participating sites. Metrics address several important aspects and functions of the consortium, including workforce development.

Objective: Among National Institutes of Health Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) hubs, adoption of
electronic data warehouses for research (EDW4R) containing data from electronic health record systems is nearly
ubiquitous. Although benefits of EDW4R include more effective, efficient support of scientists, little is known about

Introduction: Early life exposures affect health and disease across the life course and potentially across multiple generations. The Clinical and Translational Research Institutes (CTSIs) offer an opportunity to utilize and link existing databases to conduct lifespan research.

The Vanderbilt Institute for Clinical and Translational Research implemented the "Studio" Program in 2007 to bring together experts to provide free, structured, project-specific feedback for medical researchers.

Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems typically define laboratory test results using the Laboratory Observation Identifier Names and Codes (LOINC) and can transmit them using Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resource (FHIR) standards. LOINC has not yet been semantically integrated with computational resources for phenotype analysis.

Introduction: There is a clear need to educate and train the clinical research workforce to conduct scientifically sound clinical research.

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OBJECTIVES/GOALS: Innovations with positive health impact are a high priority for NCATS and CTSAs. Program design that uses the Causal Pathway approach incorporates performance indicators that assess impact. We applied Causal Pathway thinking to an ongoing national program to enhance the evaluation of program impact. We report Lessons Learned.

Advancing understanding of human health promotion and disease prevention and treatment often requires teamwork.

Emphasis has been placed on assessing the efficiency of clinical and translational research as part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) goal to "improve human health." Improvements identified and implemented by individual organizations cannot address the research infrastructure needs of all clinical and translational research conducted.

To respond to increased public and programmatic demand to address underenrollment of clinical translational research studies, the authors examined participant recruitment practices at Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) sites and make recommendations for performance metrics and accountability.

Introduction: Addressing rural health disparities has unique challenges which require cross sector collaborations to address social determinants of health and help those in need get connected to care continuum.

Health information technology (HIT) can address important problems in clinical care and biomedical research. These problems include lack of compliance with clinical practice guidelines [1], insufficient use of preventative medicine services [2] and numerous impediments to clinical/translational research [3].

To probe the complexity of modern diseases, multidisciplinary approaches are increasingly applied. Typically underpinning such studies are collaborations between wet bench experimentalists and dry lab bioinformaticians. Despite the need, bioinformatics collaborators remain difficult to find.

Electronic health records (EHRs) provide great promise for identifying cohorts and enhancing research recruitment. Such approaches are sorely needed, but there are few descriptions in the literature of prevailing practices to guide their use. A multidisciplinary workgroup was formed to examine current practices in the use of EHRs in recruitment and to propose future directions.