Iowa College Receives Grant from National Institutes of Health

Palmer College of Chiropractic's Executive Director for Research Christine Choate, D.C., Ph.D., announced that the College recently received official notice of a grant award from the National Institutes of Health, National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. This is a one-year grant for $110,000, with an option for an additional three years at a total of approximately $750,000. This grant will aid in Palmer's ongoing efforts to further develop faculty, create a more evidence-based curriculum and expand research efforts throughout the College.

Palmer University News

Palmer Receives National Institutes of Health (NIH) Grant for Expanding Evidence-Based Practice Across the College

Palmer College of Chiropractic’s Executive Director for Research Christine Choate, D.C., Ph.D., announced that the College recently received official notice of a grant award from the National Institutes of Health, National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. This is a one-year grant for $110,000, with an option for an additional three years at a total of approximately $750,000. This grant will aid in Palmer’s ongoing efforts to further develop faculty, create a more evidence-based curriculum and expand research efforts throughout the College.

“Palmer is committed to providing the best education possible to future doctors of chiropractic,” Dr. Choate said. “An important component of this process is to enhance our students’ ability to think critically and to incorporate new knowledge about how to deliver high quality chiropractic care to patients. This grant will enhance Palmer’s ability to carry out this important component of our mission. We are very excited that the NIH shares our enthusiasm for this team effort between research and academic affairs at Palmer.” The program will be started on the Davenport Campus and then rolled out to the West and Florida campuses.

“Our faculty and administration remains committed to providing the best education possible for our students, preparing them for the demands of chiropractic practice and the contemporary evidence-based health care environment they will encounter,” Vice Chancellor for Academics Dennis Marchiori, D.C., Ph.D., remarked. “Having external support for these on-going efforts is very important to improve our program at a more rapid pace than would otherwise be possible.”

Added Cynthia Long, Ph.D., a professor on Palmer’s research faculty who along with Dr. Choate serves as co-principal investigator for this project: “We will start out by assessing attitudes and knowledge among faculty and students about evidence-based practice. This information will help us in developing training programs to assist faculty in incorporating research findings and evidence in courses throughout the curriculum. In addition, the grant will provide more opportunities for faculty who have a specific interest in research to train through the Master of Science in Clinical Research program and pursue small research projects. Plans also include taking topics from the graduate program, such as bioethics and scientific writing, and offering this information to interested faculty through small workshops.

Students also will have more opportunities to do research through this project, Dr. Long said, by expansion of the Research Honors Program.

Educators and researchers at the University of Iowa and Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, Pa., will serve as consultants to Palmer in implementing faculty and student training programs in evidence-based practice. In addition, a Palmer advisory committee consisting of a cross section of administrators, faculty and students will play a key role in implementing the objectives of this grant. The committee is co-chaired by Dr. Choate and Dr. Marchiori, and includes:

Kristi Ferguson, Ph.D. (University of Iowa)
Cynthia Long, Ph.D. (Palmer Research)
Kevin Lyons, Ph.D. (Thomas Jefferson University)
Rita Nafziger, M.B.A. (Palmer faculty and Senior Director of the Center for Teaching and Learning)
Robert Percuoco, D.C. (Palmer Academic Affairs)
Gary Rosenthal, M.D. (University of Iowa)
Daniel Weinert, D.C., M.S. (Palmer Academic Affairs and faculty)
Mark Wilson, M.D., M.P.H. (University of Iowa)
Kurt Wood, D.C. (Palmer Executive Dean for Clinic Affairs)
A Palmer Clinic faculty member (currently Terry Bernard, D.C.)
Palmer Student Council President (currently James Leonette)

The process for obtaining this grant has been long, as it was initially submitted two years ago, then re-submitted a year ago by William Meeker, D.C., M.P.H., Palmer’s former research head who is now president of the West Campus. According to Dr. Meeker, “It was a long time coming, but the reward is worth the wait. This grant will allow us to begin implementing evidence-based practice throughout the Palmer curriculum. In addition, it is the early stages of implementing best practices in chiropractic throughout Palmer College of Chiropractic.”

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Contact: Lori Leipold, Media Relations; Palmer College of Chiropractic; Phone (563) 884-5726; fax (563) 884-5225; e-mail: [email protected]; College web site at www..palmer.edu