Cary Gross Profile picture
Primary care doc | Director, #Cancer Outcomes (COPPER) Center & Nat'l Clinician Scholars Program @Yale | Associate Editor @JAMAInternalMed | Tweets own

Apr 25, 2021, 9 tweets

For decades, receipt of multi-million $$ R01 @NIH grants has been crucial for med school research-focused faculty to gain promotion/tenure. **But this harms individuals & institutions** THREAD on why we must drop this “R01 Golden Ticket” mentality. (1/7)

Why is the #R01GoldenTicket a problematic promotion criteria? First, ⬇️⬇️ in NIH funding paylines has raised the bar ⬆️⬆️ over time. Success rates for R01 proposals were 25%-30%; now hovering far lower:
bit.ly/3u4JyRk (2/7)

This scarcity of funds has predictable results:Recent analyses by Mike Lauer @NIHgrants @NIHDirector showed that fewer than half of NIH Career Development Grant Awardees (a highly selected population) had received an RO1 grant 10 years later.
bit.ly/3lzjD1a (3/7)

The problem is not just that R01 funding is increasingly competitive. Its not a level playing field. Structural racism & sexism in science perpetuates inequity in @NIH funding. e.g. Black investigators systematically less likely to receive funding. bit.ly/3w8OZRa (4/7)

Genuflecting at the alter of the #NIH R01 grant also perpetuates gender bias in academia, given inequity in peer review, research-"protected" time, and subsequent funding. #MedTwitter (5/7)

...and here is the kicker – there is poor relation between reviews/scores of (funded) R01 proposals and actual scientific productivity – either number of pubs, or citations. (6/7) #Medtwitter
elifesciences.org/articles/13323

Do we need more NIH $$, more R01 grants? Sure. But lets change how we're evaluating faculty, to focus on their science, mentorship, collaboration. **Reward Impact** As is, we're stifling creativity, perpetuating inequity, and losing great scientists. #MedTwitter (7/7)

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