Developing clinical research incentives for academic oncologists

Incentive plans can be developed to promote clinical research activities for academic oncologists. Such plans encourage faculty to devote the necessary time and effort to enroll patients in clinical trials. It is crucial to decide what types of activities will be incentivized and to define expectations at the outset. An incentive program requires resources that should remain stable over time. A resource allocation ideally would be indexed to a level of clinical research activity so that, as activity increases, more funding is available for distribution as incentives. Most academic oncologists are familiar with incentive-based reimbursement for clinical activities; a similar structure for academic pursuits such as clinical research can be incorporated into, or used in conjunction with, a clinical incentive plan.