Invite Your Doctor to Participate in Myeloma Research

It's an exciting time to participate in myeloma research and now you and your physician can be a part of it! Invite your myeloma specialist or oncologist who sees multiple myeloma patients to submit a research proposal to the HealthTree Research Hub. 

HealthTree Foundation plans to facilitate over 100 research projects from myeloma investigators over the next 20 months in order to accelerate myeloma research and get us closer to myeloma cures for each and every patient. 

Here's how to get your physician involved today. 

Invite Your Physician to Submit a Myeloma Research Proposal 

While clinical trials are a wonderful way to conduct myeloma research, they often take years to conduct and a large sum of money to fund. Myeloma researchers need quicker, more affordable options to investigate and learn more about multiple myeloma. 

You can invite your licensed myeloma specialist or hematologist specializing in multiple myeloma (and their colleagues!) to submit a research proposal to the HealthTree Research Hub today.

In the Research Hub, myeloma investigators can perform data mining, chart reviews, synthetic control arm comparisons, or surveys and studies. Researchers are provided a login/password and R-studio research tools to analyze subsets of anonymized data based on project needs. 

How Long Does the Application Take? 

First, myeloma physicians will be asked to fill out a profile. This includes their name, organization, and other contact details. It takes one minute to fill out. 

Then, they will be directed to fill out their research proposal. This can be done in two easy steps: they click "New Proposal" and complete a form, and then they submit!

Proposals can be entered in about 20-30 minutes, or if they already have a proposal prepared, this could be a 10-15-minute process! We all know myeloma researchers are busy and we don't want to take more of their time than necessary- after all, we are accelerating research! 

Researchers will have the option to build cohorts to see the data available for use in their proposed study. These cohorts are made up of 13,000+ anonymized data profiles of individual myeloma patients. Researchers can submit more than one proposal.

What Does the Myeloma Research Proposal Look Like? 

The proposal asks researchers to fill out the following information: 

• Proposal Title 
• Research Question 
• Hypothesis 
• Strategy and Aims 
• Inclusion Criteria 
• Exclusion Criteria 

Other sections in the application include a place to upload any additional files, a question on your willingness to collaborate with others, whether you would like to analyze the data yourself or have the HealthTree Research team do it for you, and whether you will invite your patients to participate in HealthTree Cure Hub or not. 

What Is The Timeline For These Proposals? What Else Do Researchers Need to Know About Appyling? 

Applications opened on March 1st, 2024, and will stay open until March 31, 2024. During the month of April, the research proposal will be reviewed by a Research Review Panel, and if approved, it will be ranked and entered into the research queue.

Research proposals will be evaluated for the alignment of research questions with research strategy, aim(s), cohort(s) of interest, outcome measure(s), and, if applicable, survey question set.

Research strategies and aims should be brief and to the point, with outline and bullet points being sufficient. The impact of the research on patients' lives, although not explicitly stated, should be obvious and will be evaluated. A research background is not necessary, but if included, it should be brief.

If a survey is requested, please attach a document by uploading a document (.docx, PDF) or providing a link (Google Doc, Box, MS Teams folder). This will be used to evaluate the question set, and if approved and scheduled, there may be some suggested edits by the Patient Advisory Board and Research Team before the IRB submission process (e.g., alignment with existing survey questions).

Ideal survey sets contain 8-15 questions, although the Research Review Panel understands that some research questions may require larger question sets. However, this may affect the acceptability and ranking of the research proposal.

Conclusion 

We look forward to doing our part in accelerating myeloma research and giving myeloma physicians and researchers a quicker, more affordable way to conduct necessary myeloma research. Do your part by sharing this article and information with your myeloma doctors and their colleagues today!