Research
Today I have been in touch with a friend who is the director of a research institute. I asked him about funding for metastatic breast cancer: if there was 30% of research devoted to metastatic breast...
Forum Discussion
Research funding is an interesting animal.
I work for Cancer Australia as a grant review committee member for their PDCCRS funding stream. Cancer OZ administers research grants for a number of funding partners who don't want to go through all the palaver of floating the grants and assessing the applications. All this is on their website.
Anyway, every year the partner foundations/charities/philanthropics who have money to spend on research decide what they want to spend it on (define their priorities) . If two or more partners have the same priority, they either team together or consider diversifying so there is no duplication. The grants through this scheme are generally $600K over 3 years. The National Medical Health and Research Council vets the science and the committee's assess and grade the applications for each priority area. Ive got to stress, this is only one way research gets funded in Australia, but it is responsible for disseminating millions of dollars every year.
Sorry if that is a bit long winded. Anyway, the way things seem to work in this environment is the funding partners set the rules, and the scientists put together a team that can chase the money. This can make it difficult for scientists to 'specialise'. If the trends are all about DNA or inhibitors or whatever at the time, that's were the work gets done.
Its fascinating to watch, but I also wonder some times who sets the priorities. What drives the thinking in the partner organisations that makes them decide to spend money on survivorship programs, for example, one year and advancing radiotherapy techniques the next.
Anyone who can figure that out, can probably influence the direction that research may go.
I work for Cancer Australia as a grant review committee member for their PDCCRS funding stream. Cancer OZ administers research grants for a number of funding partners who don't want to go through all the palaver of floating the grants and assessing the applications. All this is on their website.
Anyway, every year the partner foundations/charities/philanthropics who have money to spend on research decide what they want to spend it on (define their priorities) . If two or more partners have the same priority, they either team together or consider diversifying so there is no duplication. The grants through this scheme are generally $600K over 3 years. The National Medical Health and Research Council vets the science and the committee's assess and grade the applications for each priority area. Ive got to stress, this is only one way research gets funded in Australia, but it is responsible for disseminating millions of dollars every year.
Sorry if that is a bit long winded. Anyway, the way things seem to work in this environment is the funding partners set the rules, and the scientists put together a team that can chase the money. This can make it difficult for scientists to 'specialise'. If the trends are all about DNA or inhibitors or whatever at the time, that's were the work gets done.
Its fascinating to watch, but I also wonder some times who sets the priorities. What drives the thinking in the partner organisations that makes them decide to spend money on survivorship programs, for example, one year and advancing radiotherapy techniques the next.
Anyone who can figure that out, can probably influence the direction that research may go.