Study examines first 6 rounds of PCORI funding
A recent study published in Academic Medicine found that less than one third of all funding distributed by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), an independent organization established under the Affordable Care Act, has been implemented in primary care settings.
Researchers from the Georgetown University Medical Center (GUMC) carried out the study, reviewing the initial six rounds of PCORI funding.
“Primary care is the cornerstone of where patients seek care, accounting for fully 50 percent of all doctor’s visits,” Daniel Merenstein, MD, GUMC director of research programs in the department of family medicine, said in a prepared statement. “We’ve reported data that at times showed PCORI funding is clearly supporting its mission of impacting the patient care experience, while other data pointed towards funding not supportive of that mission.”
Overall, the study’s authors examined approximately 300 PCORI grants from 2013 and 2014. The total money from those grants was approximately $400 million.
“Overall the record we are seeing from PCORI is a mixed bag, and while we’re not shocked that primary care is not better represented, it’s still very disappointing,” Merenstein said in the same statement.
The authors did note that PCORI appears to be successfully distributing its grants to a more diverse selection of investigators than the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Ten biomedical departments receive more than 70 percent of NIH’s total funding, but those same departments receive 42 percent of PCORI’s funding.
A pdf of the full Academic Medicine study can currently be found on the journal’s website.
More information on PCORI’s funding, including open opportunities, can be found on the organization’s website.
Michael has more than 18 years of experience as a professional writer and editor. He has written at length about cardiology, radiology, artificial intelligence and other key healthcare topics.