The vision of the Louisville Clinical and Translational Research Center (LCTRC) is to build an impactful Clinical and Translational (C&T) research program at the University of Louisville (UofL) to improve the health of Kentucky (KY) communities. Kentucky is, by any measure, a poor and largely rural state with a single large metropolitan center that suffers disproportionately from many chronic diseases. For example, KY is ranked first in the U.S. in cancer and COPD incidence. To address these problems the UofL in its research strategic planning process created Programs of Distinction in cardiovascular disease, neuroscience, cancer and metabolic disease. Thus, UofL has been very deliberate about developing research programs to meet the state’s most pressing health problems. However, UofL has approached C&T research of these health problems through underfunded and admittedly uncoordinated efforts in clinical trials infrastructure, research design, research funding, and mentorship. Also, until 2019, UofL C&T research was performed almost exclusively at two facilities. In 2019, UofL created UofL Healthcare (ULH) that has 11 hospitals, a cancer center, and multiple outpatient centers. ULH with its larger footprint and patient volume has challenged the capacity of our C&T infrastructure, but also created a major opportunity to increase the amount and quality of our C&T research. The long-term goal of the LCTRC is to build the needed workforce and expertise at UofL and our affiliated healthcare systems to conduct impactful and community engaged C&T research. We will achieve this goal through these five Specific Aims: Specific Aim 1: Expand and fully integrate clinical and translational research at UofL, ULH and other healthcare partners. (Administrative and Community Engagement and Outreach Cores). Specific Aim 2: Create and implement professional development for early-career clinician investigators, students and C&T research staff (Professional Development Core). Specific Aim 3: Develop Pilot and Developmental projects to support community scientists, trainees, early-career and established C&T investigators (Health Research Core). Specific Aim 4: Establish a centralized resource that provides LCTRC investigators with essential support in research design, data analysis, compliance, and data management (Research Design, Compliance and Data Management Core). Specific Aim 5: Invest in both community-led and community-participatory C&T research to improve public health using multi-directional inputs sensitive to the culture and needs of underserved populations. (Synergistic among all Cores). Successful implementation of the LCTRC will create a single point of access program for C&T research that allows us to perform studies in urban and rural populations that ultimately improve public health.

Our overall goal is to develop a program at the University of Louisville (UofL), its healthcare partners and the urban and rural communities we serve to perform impactful collaborative clinical and translational research. We will also leverage existing UofL IDeA programs to positively impact the health outcomes of our populace (including the underserved) and to create an interactive professional development program that will create a pipeline for the next generation of clinical and translational investigators.