Clinical Research
The Department of Orthopedic Surgery is committed to the development and maintenance of a successful and nationally recognized clinical research program. The high patient volumes within our department provides the program with the opportunity to perform both retrospective and prospective clinical studies. The focus of the clinical research is on patient outcomes as measured by the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measure, legacy patient outcomes, and state-of-the-art objective measurement tools such as dynamic radiosterography. The program is available to our faculty, supports our residency and fellowship training programs, and is active with several clinical trials.
The program has developed from the success of the Orthopedic Trauma Program under Dr. Joshua Gary’s initial supervision as a leading member of the Major Extremity Trauma Research Consortium (METRC). Dr. Stephen Warner, who has recently become the Director of the program, has expanded to assure that there is ample support for all clinical research in the department. The program has a clinical research manager, statistician, database manager, regulatory specialist, as well as a team of highly experienced research analysts and assistants. These personnel are available for study design, study conduct, regulatory compliance, statistical analysis, and publication support. The program also provides guidance and mentorship for students both medical and non-medical, residents, fellows, and faculty.
The program has been successful in attracting over $2M in research revenue during the past four years. In the past several years 144 active IRB protocols (25 funded externally) have been managed, with 66 of these protocols receiving approval during the past two years. With the introduction of the EPIC electronic health record, the program is developing a system to capture PROMs in a prospective manner for both clinical and research use. Examples of the program’s success have been the Pediatric Orthopedic Surgery division with 60 publications and presentations in 3 years and establishment of 4 prospective databases, the Orthopedic Trauma division enrolling over 1100 patient in a METRC multicenter study on thromboembolic prevention, collaboration of our sports surgeons, BioMotion laboratory and radiologists to assess Ultrashort Time to Echo (UTE) MRI to follow the progression of graft healing and an extensive Concussion research initiative.