Wednesday, March 05, 2008

NIH report on peer review

NIH has released a final draft report, "Peer Review Self-Study." The lengthy report contains recommendations for addressing the following challenges:
(1) Reduce administrative burden on applicants, reviewers and NIH staff. Recommendations include shortening the length of the application itself.
(2) Enhance rating system. Recommendations include creating a "not recommended for resubmission" category as well as providing scores for all applications.
(3) Enhance review and reviewer quality. Suggestions include the use of anonymous review to reduce possible bias against an applicant's institution, and the use of patients and patient advocates on review panels.
(4) Optimize support for different career stages and types. One suggestion is to rank early-career investigators against each other.
(5) Optimize support for different types of and approaches to science. This puts forth strategies to ensure that transformative, clinical and interdisciplinary research are included in the NIH portfolio.
(6) Reduce stress on the support system for science. Requiring a minimum percentage of effort for investigators on grants is among these proposals.
(7) Continue to scrutinize the peer review process. A data-driven assessment is recommended.
Click on the headline to view the report and accompanying materials

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