Professional Skills Program K-Grants For Lunch!

Adonis Hijaz, MDAssociate Professor

Director, Center Female Pelvic Medicine & SurgeryUrology Institute, University Hospitals Case Medical Center

Case Western Reserve University

Tissue recovery in the pathophysiology of stress urinary incontinence

• Improve tissue recovery with the use of MSC

• Determine the potential mechanism through which MSCs potentiate recovery

MSC following VD

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Sal Sys

4d

Sal Sys

10d

Sal Sys

14d

MSC Sys

4d

MSC Sys

10d

MSC Sys

14

Sal loc 4d Sal loc

10d

Sal loc

14d

MSC loc

4d

MSC loc

10d

MSC loc

14d

Control

Sal Sys 4d Sal Sys 10d Sal Sys 14d MSC Sys 4d MSC Sys 10d MSC Sys 14 Sal loc 4d Sal loc 10d

Sal loc 14d MSC loc 4d MSC loc 10d MSC loc 14d Control

Mentors

Primary Mentors

Arnold Caplan, PhD

Firouz Daneshgari, MD

Secondary MentorsAlan Levine PhDJames Liu, MD

Why K08?

• Passion for research• Great research idea• Excellent preliminary results

Clinical Productivity

Passion for research

Although essential, they are not enough in this

Highly competitive world

What does the K08 provide?

• Protected time• Mentorship• Discipline• Target

These are the additional criteria that are ESSENTIAL For successful career as a

Clinician Scientist

Lessons learned

• Be smart about picking your mentor– Authority in field with vast mentorship experience– Should share your passion and believe in your

capabilities– Willing to take on the task during the application

and thereafter– Yet would be your toughest Critique

Lessons learned

• Personal level– Learn the art/science of grant writing- read successful

applications – Perform an internal review: your areas of weakness might

be opportunities for career development – Develop thick skin

• Research Plan– Put your ideas out for critique: I submitted an (R03, R21

with revision) on the concept before embarking on the K08.

– Use the critiques to improve on your research plans and idea

Surprises

• The surprise was that I got a fundable score from first submission

Acknowledgment

• Mentors– Arnold Caplan PhD– Firouz Daneshgari MD– James Liu MD– Alan Levine PhD

• UI Grants team– Kerry Grimberg PhD– Michael Kavran– Laurel Jeffers– Claudia Lillibridge

• Laboratory colleagues– Michael Kavran– Mingfang Tao MD– Guiming Liu MD,PhD– Zubeyir Altuntas PhD– Nicholas Boncher MD– Zhina Sadeghi MD

• Grants & Contracts office – Robin Bissell – Colleen Goss – Katalin Blankenship