Making research accessible: The role of active participation in scientific inquiry in medical student education
Michael Friedlander, Fralin Biomedical Research Institute executive director and senior dean for research at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine, shares Virginia Tech’s integrated research model as a part of a panel on medical education.
Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine students spend 1,200 or more hours conducting research at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, Virginia Tech labs, Carilion Clinic, or with other partners. Some, like Kenneth Young, have extended their studies to earn an M.D.+Ph.D. degree. Photo by Clayton Metz for Virginia Tech.
Michael Friedlander, founding director of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC, will stress the importance of doing research as part of medical training April 3 at an Association of American Medical Colleges conference in Arlington.
Friedlander works closely with Leslie LaConte, associate dean for research at VTC School of Medicine, who leads the research curriculum and works closely with all of the medical students on their research projects.
Friedlander will share perspectives from the experience of building of a culture at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine (VTCSOM), partly based on students actively participating in research that provides them additional opportunities to advance health and well-being for all, including people who may benefit from their findings in the future.
“Through this process, medical students are imbued with a deep appreciation of both the power and the limitations of data and how they are obtained, interpreted and applied,” Friedlander said.
“This provides them with exciting opportunities and a broadened perspective through their deep engagement with all aspects of the research enterprise, from identifying the knowledge gap and need to conceptualizing the question and approach to implementation of the methodology and interpretation and application of the findings,” Friedlander said. “Moreover, the students have the opportunity to amplify the impact of their work through presenting their findings at conferences, publishing it in peer-reviewed journals, and even commercializing it to bring their discoveries to patients.”
Friedlander has informed perspective, not only as Virginia Tech’s vice president for health sciences and technology, but as the senior dean for research at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine.
He also served on the Scientific Foundations for Future Physicians committee, a partnership between the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, that identified the need for U.S. medical education to increase its emphasis on the emerging science of medicine and the role of the discovery process — principles that have been embraced and incorporated in the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine since its inception under the leadership of previous Dean Cynda Johnson and current Dean Lee Learman.
The research institute and Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine were founded as part of a unique public-private partnership between Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic and are in connecting, adjacent buildings on the Health Sciences and Technology campus in Roanoke.
Nearly 70 medical students selected mentors based in labs at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, while many others are carrying out their research at Carilion Clinic, on the Virginia Tech main campus in Blacksburg, or with mentors at the Children’s National Hospital.
“The research these students do contributes to their development as true scientists and physicians, sharpening their skills as clinicians. It is very gratifying to hear the reports of how deeply knowledgeable Virginia Tech Carilion medical students are about their research, both in integrating their clinical skills on wards as well as when they interview for residency positions after graduating,” Friedlander said. “The opportunity to share not only the VTCSOM experience but to contribute to the national dialogue as an invited panelist at the AAMC’s spring meeting is compelling and a chance to facilitate the consideration and incorporation of the VTCSOM model nationally in medical education.”
The panel discussion “How Learners can Distinguish Themselves Through Medical Research” is part of this joint conference that brings together the association's Council of Faculty and Academic Societies, the Group on Resident Affairs, and the Organization of Resident Representatives for three days of programming.
Others who are part of the panel include Martha Alexander-Miller, professor and chair of the microbiology department at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine; Stella Hartano, a physician-scientist and allergy and immunology fellow at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease at the National Institutes of Health; and moderator Neil Osheroff, professor of biochemistry and medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
