J Am Board Fam Med
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Evaluating research activity in research departments and education programs is conventionally accomplished through measurement of research funding or bibliometrics. This limited perspective of research activity restricts a more comprehensive evaluation of a program's actual research capacity, ultimately hindering efforts to enhance and expand it. The objective of this study was to conduct a scoping review of the existing literature pertaining to the measurement of research productivity in research institutions. ⋯ This produced 42 research capacity/productivity metrics that fell into 7 relevant categories: bibliometrics, impact, ongoing research, collaboration activities, funding, personnel, and education/academics. With the expertise of a Delphi panel of researchers, research leaders, and organizational leadership, 31 of these 42 metrics were included in the final PACER Tool. This multifaceted tool enables research departments to benchmark research capacity and research productivity against other programs, monitor capacity development over time, and provide valuable strategic insights for decisions such as resource allocation.
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The 1985 Hames Consortium convened family medicine researchers to identify outstanding questions in their practice. ⋯ The Hames 100 questions and categories themselves demonstrate the values and purpose of family medicine research and can serve as a powerful tool to discuss the future of family medicine research. The varied questions illustrate the broad scope of interest of family physicians in 1985, which remains just as relevant today. Our findings indicate that relatively few questions were fully answered, with even fewer questions answered in family medicine journals.
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The National Institutes of Health (NIH) are supporting the All of Us research program, a large multicenter initiative to accelerate precision medicine. The All of Us database contains information on greater than 400,000 individuals spanning thousands of medical conditions, drug exposure types, and laboratory test types. These data can be correlated with genomic information and with survey data on social and environmental factors which influence health. ⋯ This Special Communication discusses (1) obtaining access to the database, (2) using the database securely and responsibly, (3) the key design concepts of the Researcher Workbench, and (4) details of data set extraction and analysis in the cloud computing environment. Fully documented, tutorial R statistical programming language and Python programs are provided alongside this article, which researchers may freely adapt under the open-source MIT license. The primary care research community should use the All of Us database to accelerate innovation in primary care research, make epidemiologic discoveries, promote community health, and further the infrastructure-building strategic priority of the family medicine 2024 to 2030 National Research Strategy.
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In conjunction with the North American Primary Care Research Group (NAPCRG) Annual Conference in 2023, leaders in the field of family medicine came together to discuss and produce a Family Medicine Research Agenda. While multiple areas were discussed, diversity, equity, and inclusion did not rise to the top as research priorities. This article discusses the 3 areas family medicine leaders see as necessary to produce high-quality research. ⋯ Chairs can also increase the diversity of the researcher pool by recruiting among local full-time clinicians, a more diverse group than most faculties. For the final area, "Build a national infrastructure for organizing and optimizing family medicine research opportunities," the authors present solutions including following demographic data surrounding authorship and reviewing for journals; having dedicated committees or editors focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion; and using demographic data from conference submissions to encourage those from underrepresented backgrounds to translate their presentations into a manuscript. These strategies can help equity, diversity, and inclusion become central to our research and be used as a national model for other specialties attempting to do the same.
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Osteopathic physicians (DOs) comprise a growing portion of family physicians. In 2023, more DO seniors matched into family medicine than MD seniors, and nearly a quarter of US DO seniors matched into family medicine. Family medicine benefits from the osteopathic philosophy of whole-person care, though this provides challenges regarding research in family medicine. ⋯ Second, osteopathic manipulation training emphasizes techniques that are not compatible with current theories of anatomy and pathology. The reduced research emphasis among osteopathic trainees can be addressed by strategies that focus on enhanced research exposure and a cultural shift toward fearless reevaluation of these inconsistent beliefs. Improvements in research training and culture among osteopathic trainees (including medical students and residents) will directly benefit osteopathic medicine, family medicine, and patients.