NIH OFFICE OF EMERGENCY The Why and How of Getting Funding for Your Research

By Jeremy Brown, MD

There are dozens of different grant In previous columns I discussed how the Office of Emergency Care Research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) can help you with submitting a grant application, and the special place of training (K) grants. But why apply for grant support at all? It seems like a strange question to ask, but it is perhaps the most important question of all.

Before you begin a research project, whether it be a simple, single site survey in your own emergency department (ED) or a multicenter double-blind placebocontrolled trial, the second question to address (the first being what it is that you want to study) is: “do I need money to do this?” It may well be the case that you can complete your study goals without any funding at all. You could review ED records in your own institution without funding, and you may be able to deliver a survey to patients with the help of a few volunteer students from your affiliated or local university. This certainly requires work and careful coordination, but if you don’t need additional funds, then don’t apply for them, as doing so makes the process longer and much more complicated.

If a study is going to involve several sites, or involve additional tests, medications or follow up, you will almost certainly need funding — and often you will need quite a lot of it. Before applying to the NIH, whose process is long and success rate is low, think about other funding possibilities. It is possible that your own emergency department, hospital, university, or health care system may have funds to support your work; if that is the case, then apply for them. There may also be state funds available and although the amounts are often modest, it is certainly important to investigate this possibility as well. Next, consider private foundations or disease advocacy groups. There are many of these, and finding them may be a challenge, but get help from your medical librarian or grants office. Some patient advocacy groups are very well funded and may allocate hundreds of thousands of dollars towards research funding. The American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP), SAEM, and other professional organizations may be able to support your work, so spend some time looking into those potential opportunities as well. Finding