DIHI Scholarship Program

The Duke Institute for Health Innovation (DIHI) is a platform and resource for Duke University and Duke Health faculty, staff, trainees, and students to advance transformative innovations in health and healthcare delivery. DIHI is a hub that facilitates collaboration with those external to Duke Medicine and is an entry point for the Duke University Health System (DUHS) to develop and test new models of care, validate new technologies and lead research to develop insights on complex system transformations.

The Clinical Research and Innovation Scholarship program was created in 2014 to pioneer transformative leadership and to prepare medical students to lead innovations in health care. In 2020, our team published outcomes of the scholarship that showed that a diverse cohort of medical students simultaneously achieved impressive academic and operational outcomes and significantly improved understanding of domains related to health innovation and AI.

Third year Duke University School of Medicine students can play a pivotal role through active participation in developing, testing and evaluating DIHI supported pilot projects. The DIHI clinical research and innovation scholarship will support a student to join an innovation pilot project team for the duration of third year. 

DIHI and DUHS select innovation projects to pilot within the healthcare system every year through a structured Request for Application process. Funded pilots address actual and important problems encountered by care providers, patients and their loved ones in the DUHS, and represent urgent health challenges nationally. Each project is led by Duke clinical and research faculty in tandem with operational leaders to ensure that the innovative pilots not only meet rigorous standards, but also are tested and validated in a real clinical setting within DUHS. A list of funded projects and involved faculty can be found at the following URL: https://dihi.org/projects/. Every year, funding decisions are made in February for pilots to begin in April.

The DIHI clinical research and innovation scholar will have the privilege of working closely with senior health system leaders and will be expected to attend regular meetings with DIHI team members and advisors. The student will be included in discussions relating to innovation across the four DIHI pillars (implementation and health delivery science, health technology innovation, health leadership development, and applied health policy) and will represent DIHI at events and conferences outside of Duke related to healthcare innovation.

Participating scholars in the program will also:

• develop leadership skills through projects with real stakes and real impacts; reading discussions (e.g., innovation, innovators, alternative payment models, algorithms, regulation, hiring, change management, strategy, and decision making); and by giving presentations to internal and external stakeholders;
• develop technical skills through DataCamp data science educational content; curating data, performing analysis, build models for projects; a structured data science curriculum with presentations and case studies; and
• gain career development through fireside chats with MDs who pursued careers in innovation (e.g., VC, startup founder, and Director of Innovation for Primary Care) and a series of journal club discussions and targeted workshops.

FAQs

What determines eligibility?

-Must be a third year Duke University Med student and you are only eligible to apply for the projects within our project list.

I have a project that I have identified, can I apply for a DIHI scholarship?

-You can only apply for the projects within our project list.

What is the time commitment and expectations?

-The commitment is 10-12 months full-time and you are expected to be present onsite in the DIHI office each work day aside from clinic hours.  

What is the scholarship amount?

-Up to $15,000

If I am enrolled in the MSTP program, would I be eligible to apply for the DIHI scholarship?

-Yes, if you can manage all three areas while being present full time here at DIHI.