An examination of radiological research funding by NIH between clinical radiologists and non-clinicians

Purpose: Little is currently known about the balance of research grant funding between clinician and non-clinician researchers. This project seeks to characterize differences in funding and funding trends between clinician and non-clinician scientists in radiology.

Methods/Materials: Data on National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants awarded for all radiology projects were obtained from the NIH Reporter from 2012 through early 2023. A list of all practicing clinical radiologists was obtained from the National Plan and Provider Enumeration System (NPPES) from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Using NPPES data, all available NIH grants were categorized based on whether the principal investigator was a practicing/billing radiologist.

Results: A total of $5.01 Billion of NIH grant funding was awarded for radiological research between 2012 and early 2023 across a total of 11,056 projects, awarded to a total of 1762 unique principal investigators. Among those principal investigators, 264 (14.98%) were practicing radiologists. A total of $700 million in financing was provided to 1613 projects led by practicing radiologists, accounting for 13.97% of all money awarded for radiology research by the NIH. Clinician and non-clinician researchers received a median of four grants, with a mean of 6.2 and 6.3 grants and mean grant funding of $2.6 million and $2.9 million, respectively. The greatest growth was seen among clinician-researchers, with the number of grants and total funding increasing from $40.7 million across 102 grants in 2012 to $93.9 million across 224 grants in 2022. Among clinician researchers, 192 (72.7%) identify as male, and the remaining 72 (27.3%) identify as female. Primary specialty of clinician researchers within radiology are as follows: 138 (52.3%) within diagnostic radiology, 12 (4.5%) within interventional radiology, and 114 (43.2%) within radiation oncology.

Conclusions: Clinician scientists continue to offer great value and contribute significantly to the scientific advance of radiology. Despite comprising a relatively small percentage of grants and funding amongst the overall radiology specialty, clinical radiologists are seeing stronger increases in grant funding in recent years.