Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons (SAGES) grant impact on recipient academic career

INTRODUCTION: Surgical societies, including SAGES, distribute grant funds to support research, as well as to promote recipient careers. Although we hypothesize that these awards have a positive impact, no objective evidence exists. We sought to benchmark the scientific productivity of the grants, the academic success of the recipients, and the generation of further research projects. METHODS: All SAGES grant principle investigators (PI) and co-PIs were surveyed using Survey Monkey™. Questions included resultant presentations/publications, ensuing funding, academic promotion, further research initiatives, and opinions on grant impact. A Medline query of all grant recipients was used to verify and supplement this data. RESULTS: 48 of 108 recipients (44%) responded to the survey, with 81% of respondents listed as the PI. The majority of the funded studies (73%) were accepted for presentation at a national meeting, with 89% presented at SAGES and 9% receiving various meeting awards. Grant recipients attended 3.8 of the last 5 SAGES meetings. Respondents also reported a 64% rate of publication, with the majority published in Surgical Endoscopy (68%). Of recipients, 84% had at least one publication identified by a Medline search, with an average of 32 papers since grant completion. Among the awardees, 43% received further research funding, most frequently (43%) from a professional organization and occasionally (7%) from the National Institutes of Health. The amount of extramural funding received was greater than US $50,000 for 67% of the awardees, with half of those receiving more than US $200,000. CONCLUSION: SAGES grants have a strong impact on recipient academic careers. Future funding, society activism, and publication are favorably influenced by these grants. SAGES should continue to support research with this successful mechanism as a necessary tool for the academic growth of recipients and development of research deemed important by SAGES.