Increasing Family Physicians’ Scholarship Capacity and Output: Scholarship Trends and Perceived Research Culture

Context: The field of family medicine has made limited progress in creating a culture change to fully embrace research as part of everyday practice. Such a culture would contribute greatly to evidencebased medicine and better patient care. The University of Minnesota Department of Family Medicine and Community Health (DFMCH) aimed to increase research infrastructure and resources to increase clinical faculty engagement in research and thereby improve our research/scholarship culture.

Objective: The aim of this study was to examine faculty scholarship output over time and perceived research culture.

Study Design and Analysis: This retrospective study analyzed scholarship data obtained for clinical faculty employed in the DFMCH in 2013, 2016, 2019 and 2022. Additionally, data from a research culture survey conducted in 2022 were summarized.

Setting or Dataset: Scholarship data were obtained via an internal platform that pulls information directly from the Scopus database. The research culture survey evaluated faculty perceptions of the DFMCH’s infrastructure and support, as well as their own research capacity.

Population Studied: In 2022, the DFMCH had 76 clinical faculty.

Intervention/Instrument: Since 2013 the DFMCH has invested significant resources into improving our research culture.

Outcome Measures: Scholarship outcomes of interest include the total number of publications, proportion of faculty with at least one publication and proportion of faculty with at least one first author publication. Survey outcomes include research measures of leadership, training, infrastructure, and personal research capacity.

Results: The total number of publications increased from 37 in 2013 to 84 in 2022. The proportion of clinical faculty publishing at least once increased significantly (X2(1)=11.123, p<0.001) from 23% (n=16) in 2013 to 50% (n=38) in 2022. Faculty with at least one first author publication increased from 15% (n=10) in 2013 to 21% (n=16) in 2022. Of the 63 faculty that completed the research climate survey (83% response rate), more than 80% thought the DFMCH had supportive leadership. Over 70% thought that there was a strong research infrastructure. Only 33% were satisfied with their own current research capacity.

Conclusions: We observed a significant increase in clinical faculty research and scholarship output since 2013. Faculty considered the research culture to be positive overall, however they also thought their own capacity could be improved.