U.S. Physician–Scientist Workforce in the 21st Century: Recommendations to Attract and Sustain the Pipeline

Abstract

The U.S. physician-scientist (PS) workforce is invaluable to the nation's biomedical research effort. It is through biomedical research that certain diseases have been eliminated, cures for others have been discovered, and medical procedures and therapies that save lives have been developed. Yet, the U.S. PS workforce has both declined and aged over the last several years. The resulting decreased inflow and outflow to the PS pipeline renders the system vulnerable to collapsing suddenly as the senior workforce retires. In November 2015, the Alliance for Academic Internal Medicine hosted a consensus conference on the PS workforce to address issues impacting academic medical schools, with input from early-career PSs based on their individual experiences and concerns. One of the goals of the conference was to identify current impediments in attracting and supporting PSs and to develop a new set of recommendations for sustaining the PS workforce in 2016 and beyond. This Perspective reports on the opportunities and factors identified at the conference and presents five recommendations designed to increase entry into the PS pipeline and nine recommendations designed to decrease attrition from the PS workflow.

An institution-wide faculty mentoring program at an academic health center with 6-year prospective outcome data

“…In a recent survey by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) of 35 medical schools in the USA, almost a third of non-retiring faculty members were planning to leave or were considering leaving their medical schools in the next 2 years [10]. Compounding the loss of existing faculty is the fact that the pipeline of new clinical and translational researchers is diminishing [11,12].…”

Participation in Health Services/Population Health Research in US Departments of Medicine

“…AAIM has had a longstanding interest in promoting the research interests of its member departments of internal medicine, including its support of three Consensus Conferences resulting in recommendations for fostering the training and career development of physician scientists. [9][10][11] Whereas much of the focus of these efforts have been targeted to nurturing the careers of physicians engaged in basic, translational, and clinical research, the emergence of health service research as an important field of investigation has broadened AAIM's "scope of research" portfolio. Based on the personal experience of the authors working at 5 AHCs, we have "selective knowledge" that department of medicine faculty are actively engaged as participants and leaders in health services/population health research.…”

Physician–Scientists in the Era of COVID-19: Gone but Not Forgotten

“…Physician–scientists are vital contributors to global biomedical research efforts. 2 Bridging the divide between scientific research and care at the patient’s bedside, they have led some of the most significant breakthroughs during this pandemic, including findings relating to corticosteroids and hydroxychloroquine. But the stagnation of many of their research projects on high-impact diseases may contribute to the hidden mortality of COVID-19 for years to come.…”