Continued impact of COVID-19 pandemic on clinical and translational science early-career researchers

Colleen Mayowski; Emma A Meagher; Andrew D Althouse; Cecilia Patino-Sutton; Maya S Thakar; Julie L Welch; Doris M Rubio; Gretchen E White

doi:10.1017/cts.2022.511

Continued impact of COVID-19 pandemic on clinical and translational science early-career researchers

J Clin Transl Sci. 2022 Dec 7;7(1):e7. doi: 10.1017/cts.2022.511. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Colleen Mayowski¹, Emma A Meagher², Andrew D Althouse³, Cecilia Patino-Sutton⁴, Maya S Thakar¹, Julie L Welch⁵, Doris M Rubio¹, Gretchen E White¹

Affiliations

¹ Institute for Clinical Research Education, University of Pittsburgh, Schools of the Health Sciences, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
² Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
³ Center for Clinical Trials and Data Coordination, Department of General Internal Medicine, University of Pittsburgh, School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
⁴ Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
⁵ Clinical Emergency Medicine, Indiana University, School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN, USA.

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic had an immediate impact on the lives and work of early-career researchers. We leveraged a cluster-randomized trial and compared survey data collected over two timepoints to explore whether these impacts persisted. Although more than a year had passed, 74% of participants reported that their research was affected in multiple ways in both 2020 and 2021. These data suggest that the effects of the pandemic on early-career researchers may be prolonged. Our findings additionally serve as an impetus to identify and implement solutions to early-career challenges that undoubtedly existed before the pandemic, but which COVID-19 brought into the spotlight.

Keywords: COVID-19; career development.