Broad Funding Challenges
Dr. Kuhn sees obtaining sufficient grant funding as the number one barrier to making important discoveries in rheumatology research.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), the largest public funder of biomedical research in the world, funds less than 1 in 10 grant applications. Even when a grant is obtained, Dr. Kuhn explains that impactful studies often require a larger sum than many grants can provide. Many grants don’t allow for the kind of risk-taking that is necessary for paradigm-shifting studies, she notes. If grant reviewers aren’t convinced that a study can be completed on time for a certain amount of money, they may be unlikely to choose to fund it.
“I think it’s discouraging for people, not being able to do the research you want to do with the amount of funding you get,” says Dr. Kuhn.
Rheumatology is also relatively underfunded compared to some other areas. For example, funding to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) has remained low compared to other institutes of the NIH.1
“If you look at what we spend and what gets raised, for instance, to fight the war on cancer, it dwarfs what we’re spending for autoimmune research,” notes Dr. Behrens. “We should be fighting a war on autoimmunity.”
Dr. Bracken argues that the available research funding has not kept pace with increasing expenses in science. Labor and other resources have become more expensive, but publishing expectations have also changed, often requiring highly sophisticated and expensive methods. “Young researchers often do not have access to the funds required to do these experiments, so it can be especially challenging for new investigators to get high-quality papers published at a fast enough rate to establish a track record that invites funding,” she says.
Awards exist specifically to help launch early career researchers, but Dr. Bracken notes that although these often cover salary, they may not provide a lot of money to cover additional costs necessary to advance the research. For early career researchers, Dr. Bracken points out how essential it is to have a well-resourced mentor to help navigate this. But that can sometimes also create a challenge for young researchers, as dependence on a mentor and ownership issues can slow the process of becoming an independent scientist.
For some, the pressures of finding funding ultimately drive the choice to pivot to other types of more secure career paths (e.g., purely clinical jobs or employment with industry, even if they’d rather have kept pursuing research).
