The JPNM Research Advisors:

• Victor H. Gerbaudo, Ph.D.
  vgerbaudo@bics.bwh.harvard.edu
  617 732-6291
• Scott Britz-Cunningham, M.D., Ph.D.
  sbritzcunningham@partners.org
  617 732-6208

Each JPNM Fellow or resident is welcomed to carry out research in collaboration with a faculty mentor, hopefully leading to the submission of an abstract and/or the publication of a manuscript, during each year of his/her enrollment in the program. Performance in this area is considered complementary to the training program, and as an optional educational activity.

Faculty Mentor

Each fellow or resident can choose a mentor from his/her first rotation site and carry out all of the initial data acquisition at this site. Highly motivated fellows with a specific research interest or mentoring relationship at another site, may choose to complete the research outside of his/her normal clinical duties.

At each site of rotation, a choice of research mentors will be available to help residents in selecting a research topic, developing methodology and acquiring and analyzing study data. The research mentor will be the resident's chief collaborator in all aspects of carrying out the project and, as a rule, the mentor and resident will jointly publish the study results.

Research Advisors

Victor H. Gerbaudo, PhD, and Scott Britz-Cunningham, MD, PhD serve as research advisors on behalf of the JPNM, to provide additional support and to coordinate research activity to ensure that each participant has a successful experience and that residents have an opportunity to learn from each other's work. The research advisors will meet with the residents once every month, during or after the monthly JPNM luncheon. Advisors are available at all times to assist residents in solving logistical problems, locating or gaining access to special resources or collaborators with special expertise, and resolving any special problems that may arise during the course of the research.

The primary responsibility for developing the research idea and methodology and for completing the acquisition and analysis of the data will rest upon the resident and his/her collaborating mentor. A mentor is expected to have an active guiding role throughout the project.

Recommended Research Timetable

Residents are strongly encouraged to adhere to the following timetable in developing their research. The timetable has been developed to permit most residents to complete a research project during their first rotation and to have an abstract ready for submission to the annual meeting of the Society of Nuclear Medicine (with a January submission deadline). If the timetable is followed, the work will also appear in time for many of the residents to include it in their C.V. before they conduct a job search.

Some residents may choose to undertake a more complex research project, involving prospective studies, for example, or laboratory work on the medical school campus. This work cannot normally be completed along the lines of the recommended timetable. In such cases, however, the resident will be expected to develop his/her own timetable, in consultation with his/her mentor and with the research advisors, and to adhere to it as closely as possible. This is essential to ensure that the goals of the project are set so as to be realistically achievable during the resident's stay in the JPNM. Obviously, work that is left unfinished is of no scientific value and also has little or no value in furthering the resident's career.

RECOMMENDED RESEARCH TIMETABLE
JULY
By the end of the second week of his/her first rotation, the resident should have chosen a mentor and the two should have met to define the research subject and basic methodology. By the end of the third week, the resident should e-mail a brief two-page proposal to the research advisors, detailing the hypothesis, aims and methods of the project and describing the results of a preliminary literature (MEDLINE) search. At the end of the month, the residents will have their first meeting with the research advisors, at which time the proposals will be discussed, along with any logistical problems that may have arisen.
AUGUST
By the end of the third week, the resident should e-mail the results of a complete review of the literature to the research advisors. Some preliminary data should also be included. This will be followed by a second meeting of the resident with the advisors.
SEPTEMBER
The monthly meeting with the research advisors will discuss preliminary data, which should be well advanced.
OCTOBER
The acquisition of data should be complete. The monthly meeting with the research advisors will discuss the results and analysis of the data, including statistical analysis.
NOVEMBER
By the end of the third week of the month, the resident should e-mail a complete draft of the abstract to the research advisors. Following this, in the last week of November or first week of December, the monthly meeting with the research advisors will be held to discuss the abstracts.
DECEMBER
Due to the holidays, no regular monthly meeting will be held, however residents and mentors are expected to submit their revised abstracts to the Society of Nuclear Medicine at this time.
JANUARY - APRIL
Monthly meetings with the research advisors will discuss full write-ups of manuscripts (which are an expected follow-up to the abstracts, whether accepted by the Society of Nuclear Medicine or not). Additional abstracts if any, being prepared for other meetings will also be assessed (RSNA, European Society of Nuclear Medicine, etc.)
MAY
The monthly meeting will be devoted to review of posters or oral presentations accepted for the Society of Nuclear Medicine annual meeting.
JUNE
There will be no regular monthly meeting.