Letter to the Editor

Abstract

and Padilha have presented a fascinating account of their plans to develop education for nurses at the doctorate level to create new research and education networks (1) . The aims of their approach are also praiseworthy -particularly their aims to respond to the needs of the population and to reduce social inequalities. However there are a number of barriers that need to be overcome before their strategy will succeed.First of all there is the goal of engendering better harmony between teaching and research. Although this is a reasonable goal, its achievement is not straightforward. In many third level educational institutions there is conflict between education and research. Many lecturers are contracted to teach but spend most of their time doing research. Indeed much of the funding that university departments receive is dependent on them applying for and winning research grants. Ironically this can lead some teaching units to neglect their teaching. More value and rewards need to be placed on those who simply deliver teaching within third level institutions.Secondly responding to the needs of the population with particular reference to reducing social inequalities is also less than straightforward. Too much research in healthcare is biomedical research and individual biomedical research barons hold a great deal of power within the universities. Most research produced is quantitative scientific research. This makes it more of a struggle to produce qualitative research or social science research or indeed to win plaudits for such research. Once again a rebalancing is needed in this direction to produce more population level research and more social science research.Thirdly and lastly ensuring more nursing input into research will also be a challenge. A network would be helpful as would a programmatic approach so that improvements are sustainable. Encouraging more interdisciplinary research would also be helpful and would likely involve partnerships and mentorship between very experienced researchers and those with less experience.The authors have laid out a significant challenge -the next steps will be overcoming the barriers and designing long-lasting improvements.We totally agree with your concerns about the lack of harmony between the dimensions of the university: teaching and research. In the School of Nursing of the University of São Paulo (EEUSP), we try to harmonize them to the activities of extension in services to the community. Professors at USP are hired to work, simultaneously, in these areas -graduation and post-graduation (Stricto Sensu), combining research to the activities to community -and the evaluation of the professors is focused on verifying their progresses in those three axes.