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• Medical Research
• Types Of Medical Research
• Life Cycle Of A Drug
• What To Expect In A Medical Research Trial
• Distinction Of Medical Research Into Primary And Secondary
• Epidemiological Studies
• Medical Research Organizations
• Methods For Medical Research

Epidemiological Studies

Epidemiological studies concentrate on investigating the causes of disease, disease frequency and change in frequency and distribution of disease. For example, each year, epidemiology research organizations look for warning signs of a disease or epidemic that they know, from previous studies, may appear and take early appropriate actions to stop mass suffering in case of an outbreak. As in clinical studies, epidemiological studies too have experimental and observational studies.

Experimental studies can either be field studies as data from a large region like a country or group studies as data from a chosen specific group.

Observational studies can take the form of follow-up studies, case control studies, prevalence studies or ecological studies.

The type of study chosen depends on scientific considerations and a number of factors such as;

a. Personnel. For research results to be accurate and relied upon, qualified personnel must form part of the research team.

b. Finances. Research studies require huge finances. This has to be secured before the start of the study to avoid cutting the study halfway for lack of enough finances.

c. Hospital capacity. Most epidemiological studies require hospital-based settings like registry data to be carried out successfully. The hospital must also be able to accommodate the number of volunteer patients for treatment and observation.

Medical Research Funding

Health issues have become a big problem in the present world. With global warming on the increase, different types of diseases are being reported all round the world. Even diseases that were thought to have been eradicated are finding their way back.

Medical research funding comes from three main sources;

a. Governments: Most governments around the world allocate huge portions of their annual budgets to their universities and research institutions to enable them carry out research activities. This has particularly been successful in the developed world. In the developing countries, much needs to be done as most of research in the medical field is mainly carried out by multi-national companies.

b. Research Organizations: There are major medical research organizations whose duty is to continuously carry out medical research to alleviate human suffering. Such organizations receive their funding from world bodies such as W.H.O., U.N. and some governments. Such organizations carry out research on epidemics that have the capability to spread all over the world in a few days such as influenza. They are always alert and continue to monitor situations all over the world.

c. Charitable organizations: A number of charitable organizations fund research activities that aim to develop cures for specific ailments that have proved difficult to deal with. Such ailments include cancer, HIV and others.

Medical research funding is normally applied for by medical scientists or medical science organizations and approval granted by a granting agency. The approval and granting take a long time as the granting agencies take time to study the proposals presented and the researchers involved.

Some research findings have turned out controversial. While some have been seen as pure manipulation of the result by funding agencies, some have been seen as having been politically influenced.