Future Directions in Primary Care Research

Nurse Grant Applicants

The Agency is actively encouraging more grant applications from nurses as principal investigators. Since 1994, nurse principal investigators have accounted for 4 percent to 7 percent of the total pool of AHRQ research grant applicants, and 2 percent to 9 percent of all funded grants during this period.

Many of AHRQ's priority areas are especially relevant to nurse researchers—disease prevention, health promotion, primary care, quality of care delivery, and service delivery—and the opportunities for nurse principal investigators are good.

However, although the Agency's funding has been increasing the past several years, much of the increase has been in specific program areas designated by Congress, such as medical errors and patient safety; in consequence, the amount of funds available for general investigator-initiated grants has been limited.

Despite this, there has been an approximately 27 percent funding rate for grant applications from nursing principal investigators in recent years. This suggests that it is the low rate of nursing applicants, rather than the funding level, that has produced the paucity of nursing research projects at AHRQ. To combat this, we need more nurse investigators applying to the Agency for support. Details of funding opportunities with the Agency are available at the AHRQ Web site, including both program announcements (PAs) and requests for applications (RFAs).

AHRQ's slogan is "quality research for quality healthcare." To accurately assess health care cost, access, and quality, it is imperative that we increase the voice of major providers of care in the United States—nurses—in research in these critical areas.

With growing nurse-specific concerns, including the worsening nursing shortage and concern regarding the relationship between nurse staffing and quality of care, it is imperative that we increase the role of nurse investigators in health care research.