Pediatric Fungal Network's (PFN) STudy of Rare Invasive Fungal DisEases in Immunocompromised Pediatric Patients (STRIDE) Career Enhancement Core

CAREER ENHANCEMENT CORE ABSTRACT The PFN-STRIDE Career Enhancement Core is the dedicated educational and mentorship arm of this rare disease clinical research consortium. Career enhancement and mentorship are critical avenues for a rare disease to garner awareness and recruit, support, and mentor investigators to dedicate research time to that rare disease. Only through a robust workforce that reflects broad skill sets among informed clinicians and focused researchers will there be significant advancements in patient outcomes in an understudied field. The overall objective of the Career Enhancement Core is to rigorously prepare physician-scientist mentees, generally junior faculty or fellows, to become independent investigators and future leaders in pediatric IFD clinical or translational research. This objective will directly contribute to the overall goals of PFN-STRIDE by expanding the network of clinicians and investigators knowledgeable and focused on pediatric IFD that engage in IFD research to increase our understanding, improve diagnosis and treatment, and ultimately improve patient care. The Career Enhancement Core will educate clinicians and investigators about pediatric IFD through innovative seminars and research conference presentations to increase awareness and harness more talent to focus on a rare disease. The Career Enhancement Core will also establish a clinical investigator training pathway for pediatric IFD to train and support the next generation of clinical researchers through purposeful mentorship and direct impactful involvement in existing and future studies. To accomplish this, a detailed mentorship approach, led by a Core Leader, Program Manager, Career Advisory Committee, and the Recruitment and Retention Team, will select a broad range of mentees and ensure their direct involvement in exciting ongoing studies. Mentees will receive an individualized learning plan, career mapping, and participate in multiple PFN-STRIDE mentoring seminars for how to be a successful physician-scientist with a focus on rare disease research. Effective mentoring is the heart of this Core and through a Mentorship for Mentors Program as well as a Junior Mentor program to ensure the long-term success of the training program, we will maintain the very best mentors. Mentees will participate for 1-2 years and then have continued support from the Career Advisory Committee for 3 years after completing the program to support them through that critical research transition. We have designed the mentorship program to provide frequent feedback through interactions between the Core Leader and Career Advisory Council, faculty mentors to provide a broad choice of research opportunities, and dedicated integration with the other clinical and translational research-related programs at both Arkansas Children’s Hospital and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.