Demonstrating translational science benefits to society

Most clinical and translational research trainees, known as KL2 Scholars, are evaluated according to the number of publications and grants that they receive while in their training. It has been standard practice to follow the trajectory of their research careers, however, until recently their careers were not evaluated for research impacts in the form of real-world benefits to society. That changed with the publication of the Translational Science Benefits Model (TSBM) from Washington University. The TSBM specifies detailed indicators of benefits in four major categories: Clinical & Medical benefits, Community & Public Health benefits, Economic benefits, and Policy and Legislative benefits. We surveyed all our KL2 Scholars dating back to the inception of our program in 2007 (n=72). For each indicator, we asked for evidence supporting the indicated outcomes. This presentation will show what kinds of potential benefits to society the Scholars reported. We will also show other potential benefits that we learned about research publications that have informed policy documents, either in the form of new legislation or changes in clinical or public health guidelines. These are potential benefits due to the lack of real-world evidence about whether the policy or guidelines have positively affected human health. An important takeaway to improve future evaluation of research benefits to society is to teach investigators how to use the Translating for Impact Toolkit from the authors of the TSBM, so they can begin to approach their research with the ultimate impact in mind.