The CTSI Community Science Café Program, led by Dr. Orsolya Garrison, DrPH, MPH, is an essential part of CTSI’s Trilateral Mutually Learning Ecosystem (healthcare system, research enterprise, and the community), with the community participating as equal partners from onset and throughout the translational research process. The overall purpose of the Program is to engage community members, clinical and translational scientists, and other stakeholders in an informal setting to participate in bi-directional dialogue of current clinical and translational research efforts and medical issues of interest selected by the community. In concert with numerous additional CTSI community engagement efforts, the Science Cafés pave the way for our “Community Clinical and Translational Research Pathway” that facilitates health and research literacy for community members towards the goal of involvement and subsequent participation in clinical and translational research; and in so doing, facilitates and supports investigators research efforts (e.g., grant submissions, research participant enrollment and retention, community engagement efforts, etc.). Collectively, all of our CTSI Community Engagement (CE) efforts work together to advance the health and well-being of our citizens through research and discovery. We will feature additional CE efforts in the future.
Goals and Objectives of our CTSI Science Café Program:
Establish a “Community Clinical and Translational Research Pathway” that is bi-directional
Establish a “Hub” in the community for health and research education
Break down the silos and misperceptions of clinical and translational research (C&TR) among community members
Strengthen Health and Research Literacy in the communities we serve
Transfer knowledge between clinical and translational researchers and community members
Demonstrate the important role C&TR plays in society, and the importance of community involvement, guidance, and participation (i.e., community ‘rights and responsibilities’ in C&TR)
Increase the participation of the community in C&TR across the research translational spectrum (T0-T5)
Create opportunities for Faculty, staff, students and community members to engage one another on health and research related issues in an environment outside an academic setting
Inspire the community to be more comfortable interacting with C&TR and medical experts
Inspire scientific and/or medical experts to be more comfortable discussing research and health issues with the public.
NIH Funding Acknowledgment:Important Reminder – Please acknowledge the NIH when publishing papers, patents, projects, and presentations resulting from the use of CTSI resources by including the NIH Funding Acknowledgement.
