From the Bench to the Trench —
A Vision for Innovative Health Care

To the individual who devotes his or her life to science, nothing can give more happiness than when the results immediately find practical application. There are not two sciences. There is science and the application of science and these two are linked as the fruit is to the tree.
 — Louis Pasteur, 1871

In the autumn of 2005, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) established funding for a new initiative with the purpose of transforming the application of scientific discoveries to new and better health care. The goal of this initiative, termed the Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA), is to finance the development of integrated, multi-disciplinary academic homes that have the consolidated resources to “1) captivate, advance, and nurture a cadre of well-trained multi- and interdisciplinary investigators and research teams; 2) create an incubator for innovative research tools and information technologies; and 3) synergize multi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary clinical and translational research and researchers to catalyze the application of new knowledge and techniques to clinical practice at the front lines of patient care” (http:// grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-RM-06-002.html).

For UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, both the timing and the vision of the NIH-CTSA program could not have been better. We are proud of our strong and renowned group of basic scientists, our dedicated and tireless group of clinical researchers, and their genuine commitment to translating the findings of the former to the practice of the latter. In addition, what distinguishes us from other medical schools around the country, and provides us with invaluable partnerships as we trans-
form our clinical translational enterprise, is our unique environment. New Jersey holds a distinctive position in the nation with respect to its population, its technology-based industry, and its highly regarded scientific and health-related institutions.

In September 2006, RWJMS and its partners were awarded a CTSA Planning Grant. Taking advantage of the strength of our research and our environment, we have developed a vision for the transformation of health care discovery and delivery in our state. In partnership with the State of New Jersey, other academic institutions, our local pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, our hospital partners, and our community health care advocates, we will develop an infrastructure whereby ideas, insights, and discoveries generated through basic scientific inquiry are brought, more rapidly and effectively, to the treatment and prevention of human disease.

In the historical approach to translational research, academic centers have been the vast providers of new ideas. Often the translational application of these discoveries has been an afterthought, rather than a driver, of the research approach. In this scenario, for every basic discovery that found a medical application, scores more lay by the roadside, due to a lack of market value or a variety of other barriers. In our new vision, all the stakeholders will take part throughout the process, from discovery to cure. We will work as teams, determining needs, directing research to fulfill those needs, and cooperating to anticipate and remove the traditional impediments to success. Importantly, as part of the process, we will train the teams of the future, so that what seems novel and innovative to us today will be common practice for the next generation.

In the words of Elias A. Zerhouni, MD, director of the NIH: “We are the edge of science, and to provoke a change be a provocateur, not the manager of the status quo. It’s extremely hard. The key thing, though, is if you don’t have a framework for a vision, nobody moves in a really new direction. Today there are genuinely new opportunities, but the new science will require interdisciplinary collaborations. That will be key.”

Kathleen W. Scotto, PhD,
Professor of Pharmacology and
Senior Associate Dean for Research