Building the Next Generation of Researchers: Mentored Training in Dissemination and Implementation Science

Problem Dissemination and implementation (D&I) science provides the tools needed to close the gap between known intervention strategies and their effective application. The authors report on the Mentored Training for Dissemination and Implementation Research in Cancer (MT-DIRC) program—a D&I training program for postdoctoral or early-career cancer prevention and control scholars. Approach MT-DIRC was a 2-year training institute in which fellows attended 2 annual Summer Institutes and other conferences and received didactic, group, and individual instruction; individualized mentoring; and other supports (e.g., pilot funding). A quasi-experimental design compared changes in 3 areas: mentoring, skills, and network composition. To evaluate mentoring and D&I skills, data from fellows on their mentors’ mentoring competencies, their perspectives on the importance of and satisfaction with mentoring priority areas, and their self-rated skills in D&I competency domains were collected. Network composition data were collected from faculty and fellows for 3 core social network domains: contact, mentoring, and collaboration. Paired t tests (mentoring), linear mixed models (skills), and descriptive analyses (network composition) were performed. Outcomes Mentors were rated as highly competent across all mentoring competencies, and each mentoring priority area showed reductions in gaps between satisfaction and importance between the 6 and 18 months post-first Summer Inst...
Source: Academic Medicine - Category: Universities & Medical Training Tags: Innovation Reports Source Type: research