Health research funding: Members' of Parliament knowledge of and attitudes toward health research and funding

Background

Establishment of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) in 2000 resulted in increased funding for health research in Canada. Since 2001, the number of proposals submitted to CIHR that, following peer review, are judged to be of scientific merit to warrant funding, has grown by 77%. But many of these proposals do not receive funding because of budget constraints. Given the role of Members of Parliament in setting government funding priorities, we surveyed Members of Parliament about their knowledge of and attitudes toward health research, health research funding and CIHR.

Methods

All Members of Parliament were invited to participate, or to designate a senior aide to participate, in a 15-minute survey of knowledge of and attitudes toward health research, health research funding and CIHR. Interviews were conducted between July 15, 2006, and Dec. 20, 2006. Responses were analyzed by party affiliation, region and years of service as a Member of Parliament.

Results

A total of 101 of 308 Members of Parliament or their designated senior aides participated in the survey. Almost one-third of respondents were senior aides. Most of the respondents (84%) were aware of CIHR, but 32% knew nothing about its role. Participants believed that health research is a critical component of a strong health care system and that it is underfunded. Overall, 78% felt that the percentage of total government spending directed to health research funding was too low; 85% felt the same way about the percentage of government health care spending directed to health research. Fifty-four percent believed that the federal government should provide both funding and guidelines for health research, and 66% believed that the business sector should be the primary source of health research funding. Participants (57%) most frequently defined health research as study into cures or treatments of disease, and 22% of participants were aware that CIHR is the main federal government funding organization for health research. Participants perceived health research to be a low priority for Canadian voters (mean ranking 3.8/10, with 1 being unimportant and 10 being extremely important [SD 1.85]).

Interpretation

Our results highlight significant knowledge gaps among Members of Parliament regarding health research. Many of these knowledge gaps will need to be addressed if health research is to become a priority.Over the past 8 years, health research has been an important but declining priority for the federal government. The development of the Canada Foundation for Innovation, the Canada Research Chairs, Genome Canada, the Networks of Centres of Excellence, the Canadian Health Services Foundation and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)¹ reflects this initial interest. Although most of these programs receive multi-year funding, CIHR receives annual funding from the federal government. However, its annual increases have not risen proportionately with the number of requests for funding it receives each year.CIHR is the federal funding body for health research and consists of 13 institutes. It supports 4 pillars of research: biomedical research, clinical research, social and cultural aspects of health and population health research, and health services and systems research. With the formation of CIHR,² federal funding for health research increased from $289 million in 2000 to $553 million in 2002, with subsequent 5%–6% annual increases until 2006. That year, the increase was 2.4%.³ The initial increases in funding stimulated a sharp rise in the number of grants submitted and funded annually. In the 2006 competition, the increase in funding was lower than expected and the success rate in the open competition fell to 16% from the mean rate of 31.7% in previous years. As a result, 60% of peer-reviewed grants rated as very good or excellent were not funded, as compared with 38% in 2001 (CIHR: unpublished data,2007).Because Members of Parliament vote annually to determine CIHR''s budget for funding health research, we surveyed Members of Parliament and their senior aides about their knowledge of and attitudes toward health research, health research funding and CIHR.