Meiling Hall, located at 370 W. Ninth St., houses the administrative offices of the College of Medicine, who recently received record-breaking research funding for the 2023 fiscal year. Credit: Courtesy of Serena Smith
Ohio State’s College of Medicine is bringing in more money than ever, now to the tune of $421.4 million across 3,100 different awards.
According to a Sept. 12 press release, the College of Medicine experienced a 14.3 percent growth in research awards during its 2023 fiscal year — which began July 1, 2022, and ended June 30 — jumping from $368.5 million in funding to the new record of $421.4 million. Carol Bradford, dean of the College of Medicine and the Wexner Medical Center’s vice president for health sciences, said each of the individual grants comprising the year’s total funding will contribute to various facets of medical research.
“We want more and more and more grants because we want to fuel the discovery so that we can really transform the health and outlook for all the populations we serve in the state of Ohio and beyond,” Bradford said.
This year’s grants, which come from a combination of federal agencies, nonprofits and industry contracts, encompass a wide variety of research areas, Bradford said. The effects of exercise on stress-induced heart disease, the relationship between e-cigarette flavors and smoking behaviors and spinal cord injury prevention are just some of the studies these grants make possible.
Craig Bryan, Trott Gebhardt Phillips Endowed Professor and clinical psychologist within the College of Medicine, is leading the research on one of these studies. Made possible by a $8.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Defense, Bryan said his grant includes five separate research studies under the umbrella of suicide prevention interventions within the military.
Bryan said while he and his colleagues were confident in their proposal, there is always a degree of uncertainty as to whether a proposal will be granted. This uncertainty, he said, made receiving the grant all the more rewarding.
“Once we got it, there was I think that initial, ‘Oh my god, this is an enormous grant,’” Bryan said. “For me, I’ve gotten lots of grants in my career by now, but it’s the biggest grant I’ve ever received. It’s definitely a very noteworthy accomplishment. Many of my more senior colleagues said [getting] a grant like this doesn’t happen very often.”
Though the mere ability to conduct these studies is exciting in itself, Bryan said this grant also opens the door for potentially groundbreaking future studies.
“Once we successfully pull this off, we can now demonstrate to [the Department of Defense] and to others that we can handle big projects — big, complex projects,” Bryan said. “And so that increases the likelihood of us being able to propose super innovative, really cutting-edge stuff that’s risky.”
With the announcement of the College of Medicine’s record-breaking research funding came the recognition of Ohio State’s ranking as the 28th best medical school for research, having increased two spots since last year’s U.S. News & World Report’s ranking on the best medical schools for research, the press release stated.
Bradford said the research numbers that informed this year’s ranking are from the 2020-21 period due to a delay in the U.S. News & World Report’s data collection from medical schools.
Overall, Bradford said the College of Medicine’s record-breaking research funding and increased medical school ranking gives her immense pride.
“It’s really, really gratifying to see people’s extraordinary success, and even more gratifying to see the impact,” Bradford said. “You get these emails, and people say, ‘I got my first grant funded’ or ‘I got this huge grant.’ It might be an email, it might be a text, it might be a phone call, but it’s so fun to see the joy of those individuals. And then to see how it’s impacting the health of the communities we serve. It’s incredible.”
Those interested in volunteering to be a research participant can find more information on the Wexner Medical Center’s website or the College of Medicine’s website.
