Journal of investigative medicine : the official publication of the American Federation for Clinical Research
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The falling percentage of doctors of medicine applying for National Institute of Health-funded research grants is 1 indicator that physician-scientists are a disappearing breed. This is occurring at a time when increased translational, disease-oriented, patient-oriented, and clinical research are national goals. One of the keys to providing sufficient numbers of physician-scientists to support this goal is the active targeting of medical students. We hypothesize that an improved research program infrastructure and responsiveness to changing student needs will increase student participation in research-oriented electives. ⋯ Although structured programs can provide step-wise research experiences of increasing intensity, students may not experience a training pipeline in which each stage relies on those before and after, and instead may sample an a la carte selection of research-based enrichment opportunities.