8 steps that could transform a clinician or clinician academics to become quality researchers

1. Do believe that engagement in research can improve clinical/healthcare performance.

2. Dedicate one day in a week to reading and writing. Submit or resubmit all previous manuscripts to at least Scopus-indexed journals.

3. Decide on 2-3 areas of interest in your specialty or subspecialty. Pour in your attention to research these areas and be a source of reference to others if not leaders at faculty, national or international levels. Along this path, do engage in a systematic review exercise of the interest area to anchor yourself more firmly, if this could not be done earlier.

4. Read or attend courses on research methodology and medical writing. Avoid lazy conferences where the topics can be learned by yourself through reading the available materials or resources such as published articles, guidelines etc.

5. Follow updates in meta-research. It is a scientific endeavour that seek out empirical evidence on the research process to find solutions that can make the research process more valid, efficient and its results more reliable. Meta-research is an evolving scientific discipline aims to evaluate and improve research practices, which includes areas of methods, reporting, reproducibility, evaluation, and incentives (how to do, report, verify, correct, and reward science). This is known as meta-science or a scientific research on scientific research. See the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford (METRICS), and the REWARD (REduce research Waste And Reward Diligence) Alliance.

6. Peer-review other manuscripts by accepting journal invitations to you. This involvement is very educational in learning how researches were done and written up.

7. Register in ResearchGate and follow your colleague. Amongst other features, this will notify you of each other's newly published articles that may be relevant and citable in future research works and publication. In addition, use social media appropriately or be helped in media engagement to broadcast your research findings for timely influence on others including policy-makers.

8. Subscribe to research newsletters, medical bulletins or content alerts of medical journals in your areas of interest. This can serve to inform you of recent publications in your areas. Such continuous updates may keep you informed of landmark studies, medical breakthroughs, new research methods etc. Thus, this would help to keep up your research interest and vigour.

Resources

1. Information on this blog is extracted from pages 153-154 in the book Understanding and Conducting Clinical Research- a Clinical Epidemiology Approach by a Clinician for Clinicians [3rd Ed.]. Boon-How Chew. 2021.

2. A shortened version of the book above is freely available as an ebook AN ILLUSTRATED VERSION- UNDERSTANDING AND CONDUCTING CLINICAL RESEARCH- A CLINICAL EPIDEMIOLOGY APPROACH BY A CLINICIAN FOR CLINICIANS BY BOON-HOW CHEW. ISBN 978-967-960-450-4

3. "High-quality Research-True Academics-Real Experts" movement concept in HPUPM.

4. Facebook of the Clinical Research Unit, HPUPM