The Hispanic Clinical and Translational Research Education and Career Development (HCTRECD) program at the University of Puerto Rico Medical Sciences Campus (UPR-MSC) has a documented track record of increasing diversity in clinical and translational research by supporting research career development of Hispanics since 2002. Our program consists of formal didactic research training (Component I) through an established institutionally supported post -doctoral Master of Science in Clinical and Translational Research (MSc). We have already enrolled 112 health professionals from multiple disciplines, including medicine, occupational therapy, audiology, dental medicine, nursing, pharmacy and psychology, among others. During this last cycle of funding, the program supported 46 peer reviewed articles on topics relevant to Hispanic health such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, infant/maternal health, and mental health. The most qualified graduates from Component I compete to receive additional support for pilot projects through Component II. Our graduates have been able to submit and obtain competitive grants from NIH such as K99/R00, R21 and SCORE awards. We also have scholars who have obtained funding from the Department of Justice and Department of Education in addition to the pilot projects awards available from other UPR programs. We will continue our successful Component I program of training scholars through our established MSc as well as our Component II program to provide advanced research skills to those scholars who excel in Component I or who have already had formal clinical and translational research training. Our renewal is innovative as it will focus on the needs identified through ongoing evaluation of the program: improving methodological knowledge and skills and addressing barriers to obtaining K awards. In addition, we will enhance our program with improvements derived from our continuous program evaluation. The main enhancements of this renewal period will be additional trainings in novel methodologies, strengthening our mentoring components, and the establishment of a K club. Through our specific aim 1, we will enhance research knowledge acquisition through courses, workshops, and consultations in advanced methodologies to address health disparities while through specific aim 2 and 3 we will enhance individualized research skills development by strengthening our mentoring component and establishing a K club.

The Hispanic Clinical and Translational Research Education and Career Development (HCTRECD) program at the University of Puerto Rico Medical Sciences Campus (UPR-MSC) will continue to develop and implement innovations that will enhance our program’s capacity and infrastructure to support even more Hispanics in research careers that can address how to reduce health disparities. To continue pursuing this goal, we will improving methodological knowledge and skills and addressing barriers to obtaining K awards. The overall goal of the HCTRECD program is to increase the number of Hispanics from different disciplines performing clinical and translational research while also increasing the knowledge on the causes and interventions that can help reduce health disparities.