b'from the time we started thinking about the grant right through current recruitment, he says.True patient engagementfromBetween the patient engagementstudy design through all aspects of model and the size of the trial, the PREP-IT trials are something rare inclinical trial conductis something orthopaedics. new, and the Department of Orthopaedics is a national leader in PREPARING A NEWthis research philosophy. GENERATION With an eye toward the future, Gerard Slobogean, MD, MPHDr. Slobogean is also engaged in mentoring emerging clinicalA GROWING RESEARCHNathan OHara, MHA, along with researchers. As innovative practicesPROGRAM the tireless efforts of the teams continue to define the direction ofresearch coordinators. There are clinical research at UMSOM, suchSince joining the UMSOM in 2015, mentoring will prove essential.Dr. Slobogean has helped theseveral more innovative studies we I want to help train the nextDivision amass more than $30want to complete; fortunately, we generation of surgeon trialistsmillion in clinical research funding.have created the infrastructure to like me, he says. Dr. SlobogeansHe credits this success to the hiringensure our success for many years, track record for training surgeonof research colleague and managersays Dr. Slobogean.researchers has led to a recent NIH grant to support his mentorship activities.One of Dr. Slobogeans most recent mentees is Aaron Johnson, MD, who recently joined the Department of Orthopaedics as an orthopaedic surgeon specializing in fracture care and joint replacement.Together with other colleagues at UMB, they are using another innovative research design called a nested cohort study, which involves using patients already enrolled in a concurrent studyin this case, the PREP-IT trials previously mentioned. The team hopes to test a novel biomarker that can make it possible for a blood test to detect infections associated with implanted orthopaedic devices before they present clinically. If it works as the team expects, the blood test will help physicians prevent infection before it spreads. Aaron Johnson, MD with Dr. Gerard SlobogeanDepartment of Orthopaedics 2019Annual Report25'