Can a medical student contribute to a clinical study?

[forsparta]

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Hey,

I want to be published on clinical studies. I think that they are the epitome of medical research and really want to contribute. Question is, as a third year medical student is there anything I can do? What skills could I offer the study?

 

[FIREitUP]

you can help in writing the manuscript, help enroll patients, and help with collecting/organizing data for the study.

 

[redpanda]

There is plenty you can do at all levels of medical studenthood, but you may want to consider whether you will actually have time in MS3 to do the project that you want to do. Everyone at my school must do a research project to graduate but most people are not doing substantial amount of work in MS3.

 

[qw098]

Yee, but expect to be like third author

 

[tmn]

Sure med students can contribute -

Wanted for study: males age 18 - 24 experiencing erectile dysfunction.

 

[redpanda]

Yee, but expect to be like third author

Haha, if you find the right PI, there are plenty of people in my program who are getting first author.

 

[qw098]

Haha, if you find the right PI, there are plenty of people in my program who are getting first author.

As a med student in preclinical years? Prob have to be second/third author a couple times before PI gives you chance to be first author.

 

[redpanda]

As a med student in preclinical years? Prob have to be second/third author a couple times before PI gives you chance to be first author.

Nope. The majority of people here who graduate in 4 years do the vast majority of their project in the preclinical years, and, yes, they not uncommonly get first author. I repeat that it is a matter of finding the right PI. For example, I came up with the research question, my PI had access to the data and facilitated that, I did the majority of the analysis and wrote most of the manuscript, and I got first author, as I darn well expect for being the primary person on this project. No, I have never published with this PI prior.

 

[evilbooyaa]

Nope. The majority of people here who graduate in 4 years do the vast majority of their project in the preclinical years, and, yes, they not uncommonly get first author. I repeat that it is a matter of finding the right PI. For example, I came up with the research question, my PI had access to the data and facilitated that, I did the majority of the analysis and wrote most of the manuscript, and I got first author, as I darn well expect for being the primary person on this project. No, I have never published with this PI prior.

I read the OP as a clinical study being something that he sets up himself and follows through on (like a clinical trial), something prospective. That I imagine would be quite difficult to be an author on (unless you help at the end and get a late authorship), and near impossible to be a first author in (as most clinical trials take a significant amount of time to pan out).

If you do chart reviews or otherwise use retrospective data, you can definitely have a first author paper, even in the pre-clinical years (assuming you put the majority of the work into it).

 

[redpanda]

I read the OP as a clinical study being something that he sets up himself and follows through on (like a clinical trial), something prospective. That I imagine would be quite difficult to be an author on (unless you help at the end and get a late authorship), and near impossible to be a first author in (as most clinical trials take a significant amount of time to pan out).

If you do chart reviews or otherwise use retrospective data, you can definitely have a first author paper, even in the pre-clinical years (assuming you put the majority of the work into it).

If that's what OP meant, then you're quite correct. I think my point in all of this is that finding a project and publishing a paper (hopefully first author) as a medical student is as much a matter of calibrating the scope of the project correctly (aka not starting from scratch, finding something covered under an IRB exemption, etc) and finding an amenable PI as it is the actual content of the project.

 

[evilbooyaa]

If that's what OP meant, then you're quite correct. I think my point in all of this is that finding a project and publishing a paper (hopefully first author) as a medical student is as much a matter of calibrating the scope of the project correctly (aka not starting from scratch, finding something covered under an IRB exemption, etc) and finding an amenable PI as it is the actual content of the project.

Fully agree. You have to jump onto projects that are near completion, or start a small project that you can complete within a year or two of intermittent work (if you're a pre-clinical student) or a year of solid work (if you're doing a research year).