Do private practice doctors have opportunities for clinical research?

[DangerRoss]

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Do private practice doctors have opportunities for research? Or is it only the physicians in the academic medicine who will have the time, fund, and resource to conduct basic science or clinical research?

 

[FutureCTDoc]

Yes they do if they make it a priority, my father did some that was published in one of his specialty's most prestigious journals while he was in private practice. It depends on what you want to do, obviously you won't have all of the toys like SEM or TEM, but it's easy enough and you can also easily play a role in clinical trials, although I don't think that is what you are referring to. Long term, longitudinal studies may be relatively easy depending on your setting as well.

 

[Morzh]

Sure. "Research" in clinical practice is as simple as looking retroactively at cases of patients you've treated, applying quality statistics, and finding interesting trends, etc.

 

[NickNaylor]

Probably not the traditional basic science you're referring to, but like others said, yes, it's possible.

 

[LizzyM]

Some are presented with opportunities to participate in clinical trials but their participation is limited to attending investigator meetings, enrolling and consenting patients to participate, handing out study drug (or placebo), recording outcomes, reporting adverse events to the sponsor, and opening their records to monitors sent by the sponsor to keep an eye on whats being done. The physician is paid by the sponsor but the cash covers the opportunity cost of not treating patients during the time you are engaged in research activities. Such investigators don't generally have a role in designing the study, analyzing the data or publishing the papers.

Basic science research almost by definition requires a lab and that almost always requires employment in academia or industry.

 

[raltima07]

Some are presented with opportunities to participate in clinical trials but their participation is limited to attending investigator meetings, enrolling and consenting patients to participate, handing out study drug (or placebo), recording outcomes, reporting adverse events to the sponsor, and opening their records to monitors sent by the sponsor to keep an eye on whats being done. The physician is paid by the sponsor but the cash covers the opportunity cost of not treating patients during the time you are engaged in research activities. Such investigators don't generally have a role in designing the study, analyzing the data or publishing the papers.

Basic science research almost by definition requires a lab and that almost always requires employment in academia or industry.

Are these people included (generally) as co-authors on the pubs? if not, then what do they gain from this research?

 

[muhali3]

Follow-up: If you are in academics, must the basic science research that you do be directly related to your specialty?

Let's say I was an academic anesthesiologist, would I not be allowed to do research in say, endocrinology?

 

[kami333]

Are these people included (generally) as co-authors on the pubs? if not, then what do they gain from this research?

They may or may not be (more not), or they could be lumped under X consortium/group (still an authorship, just not as prestigious as having your name in the author line), or be in the acknowledgments.

They may want to help people with more than just treating their symptoms, help advance their field, satisfy intellectual curiosity, or leave behind a legacy. It could also be for networking either with other physicians (for patient referrals or future jobs/employees) or pharma (consulting etc) or to get free advertising (gets new patients through your door) or they might precieve it as prestigious.

 

[HumbleMD]

The answer to this question depends a whole lot on your definitions of "private practice" and "research."

"Private practice" is a tricky term. For instance, Fox Chase cancer center isn't directly paired with a University and (I believe) is for profit. They run a number of cancer trials, some run by pharma, some not. Is participating in, say, a Genentech or Amgen phase II or III cancer trial "research" by your definition? If so, then yes, absolutely. Are you going to get authorship? Maybe, but probably not - but why would you care if you're not in a tenure track job?

If "private practice" is you hanging a shingle, or operating out of a smaller practice group, you probably won't have the protected *time* or money to conduct meaningful research (what a University provides). But again, I've seen small groups like these helping enroll patients in trials run by someone else. You won't be running your own trials, because this is expensive and requires a lot of infrastructure (for starters, whose IRB will you go through? Who's paying for the labs?). Basic science research is out of the question.

To another poster, no, your research doesn't have to be in the purview of your specialty, but it ought to be peripherally related (simply for you to have face validity at journals and among colleagues, and when applying for NIH grants).

Getting down to brass tacks OP, is this a serious question, or are you just asking because you plan on a private practice anesthesia or derm position, but want to tell schools you're applying to that you have research aspirations? If so, it's a pretty transparent argument. Or, if you're worried about being able to see patients AND do research, then clinical research is the place for you. You'll make a little less money, but an academic clinical researcher often operates on a 20% clinical/80% research split, so you're still seeing patients. I used to think it was a false dichotomy of all research or all academics until I started seeing how these things actually work. Consider MD programs with a strong Epidemiology footing.