Grant Writing Study Section Reviewer’s Top 10 TipsStudy Section Reviewer’s Top 10 Tips

Academy for Faculty AdvancementAcademy for Faculty Advancement

Emelia J. Benjamin, MD, ScM

The NHLBI’s Framingham Heart StudyThe NHLBI’s Framingham Heart Study

Boston University School of MedicineBoston University School of Medicine

No industry relationships to discloseNo industry relationships to disclose♥ 1R01HL092577♥ 1R01HL102214♥ Associate Editor, Circulation

• Sally Rockey, Rock Talk, • http://nexus.od.nih.gov/all/2012/02/03/our-commitment-to-supporting-the-next-generation/

• Sally Rockey, Rock Talk, • http://nexus.od.nih.gov/all/2012/02/03/our-commitment-to-supporting-the-next-generation/

• NIAID has made four successful R01 applications available with the reviewers’ comments: http://funding.niaid.nih.gov/researchfunding/grant/pages/appsamples.aspx

• Page that Isabel and I put together on grant writing tips: http://www.bumc.bu.edu/facdev-medicine/for-researchers/grant-writing/

BUMC Grant Writing Resources

• Associate Provost for Research• Carter Cornwall’s Proposal Training• Clinical Research Resources Office• Clinical and Translational Science Institute• Corporate and Foundation Relations• Expertise and Instrumentation Search• Office of Medical Education • Office of Sponsored Programs• Vice Chair for Research (DOM)

1. How do Reviewers Work?

• Hard

• For virtually all grant reviewers, the study section work takes place after their day job

• Your job is to make their job easy

2. What type of grant should you apply for?

• Bookmark funding websites NHLBI

» http://grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/424/index.htm» listserv@list.nih.gov

Your specialty society» E.g. AHA, ACS, etc.

• Check sponsored programs for other opportunities e.g. Robert Wood Johnson Flight Attendant Medical Research Institute Local foundations Read the BU sponsored programs emails

2. What type of grant should I apply for?

• Review eligibility & match the funding mechanism with Your idea Training Publication record

2. What type of grant should I apply for?Team Sports

• Advantages of MPI Psychological advantage of spreading the wealth Complementary skill sets Translational

• Ability to cover salary with only your funding Can you provide value being a co-investigator another

person’s grants

3. Getting StartedHow do you Pick a Topic?

• What excites you?

• Will it help you build an identity distinct from your mentor?

• Look at NIH Reporter to see what is funded by your institute, on your topic, via your mechanism http://projectreporter.nih.gov/reporter.cfm

• Will it build to an RO1

3. Getting Started?The Blank Page

• Ask to see colleague’s successful grants

• Ask to see colleagues’ critiques

•Have you blocked out time to write your grant

4. How important are the Specific Aims?

• The reviewer should know in one page

Why the question is important

Why your approach is innovative

Your aims

» What hypothesis you seek to test

Why your team/environment is well-suited to the conduct the study

For a training grant

»How the study fits into the rest of your career

5. What do Reviews want to Read?

• Novel science that answers an important question

Novel

»Will the study shed new insights

»Look in an unstudied/understudied population

»Use an innovative technique

Clinical relevance

»Does it address a question of public health significance

»Could you explain to a lay person ‘so what’

»Think family reunion & elevator speech

6. What dew Raveiwrs KNOT want to sea?• A sloppy grant

NO typos / grammar problems Correct references Clear subject headingsLogical flow• Leads to concerns about ability to conduct careful research, publish high impact

papers • A well-laid out grant makes it easier for the Reviewer to see the science• Slick presentation cannoT RESCUE HO HUM contentA sloppy grant

NO typos / grammar problems Correct referencesClear subject headings Logical flowLeads to concerns about ability to conduct careful research, publish high impact

papers • A well-laid out grant makes it easier for

• the Reviewer to see the scienceSlick presentation cannot rescue ho hum content A sloppy grant NO typos /

grammar problems Correct references Clear subject headingsLogical flow Leads to concerns about ability to conduct careful research, publish high impact papers A well-laid out manuscript makes it easier for the Reviewer to see the science Slick presentation cannot rescue ho hum contentA sloppy grant

NO typos / grammar problems Correct references Clear subject headings Logical flow

• Leads to concerns about ability to conduct careful research, publish high impact papers A well-laid out grant makes it easier for the Reviewer to see the scienceSlick presentation cannot rescue ho hum content

6. What do Reviewers NOT want to see?• Slick presentation cannot rescue ho hum content but

• A sloppy grant Instead aim No typos No grammar problems Avoid long paragraphs Correct references Subject headings Avoid tiny font Logical flow Avoid TNTC abbreviations

• Sloppiness encourages concerns about ability to conduct careful research, publish high impact papers

• Lucid writing, organized, well-laid out grant makes it easier for the Reviewer to see the science

• Can scientist not in the field understand the grant?

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Exercise

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Significance

• Not of major public health import

• Technical tour de force, but so what

• Lack of a conceptual model

• Lack of stated hypothesis seeking to test

‘fishing expedition’

• Lack of generalizability

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Innovation

• Incremental

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Investigators

• Unclear next steps Does the project build your career RO1

• Lack of publications in field

• Lack of completion prior funding aims

• Key expertise lacking Statistician, Bioinformatician Specific experimental technique

• So much funding or lack of protected time Unclear ability to participate on current application

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Institutional/Environment

• Lacking

Specific mentoring plan

Experts in field

Lack of space

Protected time

Support for career

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?Approach

• Overdependence project completion on success of 1 aim

• Timeline

Over-ambitious

Unrealistic

Absent timeline

• Confounding

• Quality control for measurements

7. What Are Common Pitfalls?• Approach not worked out• Statistical methods reviewed by a statistician

Power calculations »Several scenarios with assumptions laid out»Easy to understand

Multiple testing

8. Features that Wow the Reviewer

Picture that elegantly and simply captures

•Your conceptual model

•Illustrates your data

•Outlines your study design

•Added bonus of breaking up the text and allowing the grant to breath

9. When should an early career investigator start working on a grant?

1. You cannot start too early2. With the 2 submission rule you need the first

submission to be strong Grants not discussed have a higher chance of ‘double

jeopardy’

3. Specific aims formulated at least 3 months in advance

4. First draft 8 weeks

5. Mentors and colleagues have time to review draft at least 1 month in advance

6.6.You cannot start too earlyYou cannot start too early

Budget• Do not over or under budget

10. What if it doesn’t get a good score?• Regroup with your mentors

• Address all major issues raised by the Reviewer

Quote the Reviewer directly

Have multiple colleagues read your introduction

• If you disagree, do so with utmost respect

• Setbacks are opportunities

To reassess, realign, reinvigorate

Reviewers may have saved you from wasting 4 years on a project to nowhere

• The key to success in research is resiliency

Get Involved in Your Professional Organization