Empowering Clinical Researchers Post-COVID
Photo credit: Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
Helping marginalized physician-scientists make up for lost time
Spring of 2020 was a tough time to be a working parent. As schools and daycares suddenly closed and jobs went remote, work/home lives collided, and many professionals were forced to pause important work projects to focus on new caregiving responsibilities.
For many researchers and physician-scientists, especially women and mothers, this was especially catastrophic. Years-long studies on the cusp of breakthroughs or about to receive new funding were suddenly placed on the back burner as priorities were forced to shift.
Now, more than two years later, though the pandemic is certainly not behind us, the momentum is finally picking back up. In Chicago, this is largely thanks to the COVID-19 Fund to Retain Clinical Scientists: a one-time, collaborative funding opportunity spearheaded by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and supported by the American Heart Association, the Burroughs Wellcome Fund, Rita Allen Foundation, and Walder Foundation, that aims to help sustain research productivity of physician-scientists faced with periods of family caregiving responsibilities.
This past year, funds were awarded to both Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine and the University of Chicago’s early-career university researchers.
“In addition to the individual impact this will have on the people receiving this funding, I’m also excited about the institutional impact,” said Dr. Vineet Arora, Dean for Medical Education at UChicago Medicine. “This grant comes at a time that amplifies and builds on the strong foundation that the University of Chicago has already invested in by focusing on areas of equity across the spectrum of academic medicine. We want to highlight the University of Chicago as a great place not only to train but also to work, where we are sensitive to issues related to equity, such as those with caregiving responsibilities.”
‘I don’t have to pause when life happens’
Dr. Bhakti Patel, a pulmonary and critical care doctor and Assistant Professor of Medicine at University of Chicago Medicine, faced similar challenges in recent years.
Just before the pandemic hit, Patel had received crucial funding from the NIH to help her launch a research project studying how to prevent long-term disability in patients who ended up on ventilators during an extended ICU stay. Pre-COVID, her intent was primarily focused on pneumonia patients.
Dr. Bhatki Patel (left) with her family. Photo credit: Dr. Bhakti Patel.
“I felt like the pandemic set me back at least 6 months. But now, having this extra person on my team, I don’t have to pause when life happens,” says Patel. “I don’t have to sacrifice my responsibilities to my husband or my child. I can have a little more resilience when the other shoe falls.”
When COVID erupted and ventilator shortages became an issue of national news, the issue took on even greater importance but Patel was forced to sideline her potentially revolutionary research.
“When the pandemic started, I had a 7-month-old at home, and my husband is an obstetrician. Babies were still being born, so he had to stay working,” she says. “As an ICU doctor, I was a part of the pandemic response; however, my research was important and relevant too. But, of course, I fell behind. Everything I was doing was threatened, in a way, because I was just so exhausted. I couldn’t sit back and think.”
Thanks to the COVID-19 Fund to Retain Clinical Scientists, Patel is now fully back on her feet. She used the funds to hire a research assistant who she says is “absolutely keeping the research mission afloat."
“I felt like the pandemic set me back at least 6 months. But now, having this extra person on my team, I don’t have to pause when life happens,” says Patel. “I don’t have to sacrifice my responsibilities to my husband or my child. I can have a little more resilience when the other shoe falls.”
Dr. Patel is one of nine fellows receiving this funding at the University of Chicago this year, with a goal to fund a second cohort of nine next year.
Making up for lost time
Dr. Amanda Marma Perak, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Preventive Medicine at the Feinberg School of Medicine and Lurie Children’s Hospital, was halfway through a five-year grant for early career researchers from the NIH when COVID-19 struck.
“There were many months during the pandemic when my husband and I had to take turns watching our three-year-old, plus I was pregnant,” Perak says. “With our usual childcare unavailable, by the time I finished maternity leave after my son was born, I was very behind on my grant. It’s the type of thing you really need all five years for, and I lost critical time.”
Perak is one of 13 Northwestern researchers receiving support from the COVID-19 Fund to Retain Clinical Scientists to help make up for that delay. With the additional grant funding, she’s been able to hire a research coordinator to handle the day-to-day operations of her research projects.
For instance, in one major study she is conducting on social determinants of health in adolescents, Perak’s new coordinator will take the lead on assembling patient sample kits, tracking who enrolls in the study, mailing the kits out, and more—all critical tasks that would have otherwise further eaten away at Perak’s limited time left in her NIH grant.
“This will be incredibly helpful to allow me to be more productive and make up for lost time,” Perak says.
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