Science Support Center

SSC	science support center

Providing Methodologic, Logistical, and Editorial Support to the Health Science Enterprise

The Science Support Center (SSC) provides methodological and technical guidance to institutions, government and otherwise, engaged in health science research. With a special emphasis on comparative effectiveness and systematic review, the SSC offers a range of services to sponsors of health science in the public interest.

Services include support in the development of methodological guidance as well as procedural and reporting guidance and templates, the development of web sites and web-based data visualization, and technical editing services. Particular emphasis is placed on editorial management of peer and public review.

SSC clients include the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI), the Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality's (AHRQ) Evidence-based Practice Center Program (EPC), the Portland VA's Evidence-based Synthesis Program (ESP), and the Health Experiences Research Network (HERN).

The Science Support Center is practiced at managing external review processes for projects of various sizes and needs, from small journals to large national groups. The SSC currently coordinates the external review process for PCORI, the EPC Program, and the ESP. Past customers include Medical Decision Making (MDM), the journal of the Society for Medical Decision Making. The Science Support Center provides:

Independence and confidentiality: The IOM standards for external review make clear the importance of protecting the confidentiality of reviewers, unless these rights have been waived. The Science Support Center has experience in conducting both blinded and nonblinded review processes.
System for ensuring integrity: The Science Support Center uses software that allows for easy tracking of email correspondence and all reviewer and editor comments. Version history is controlled, making it simpler to ensure that authors consider and respond to comments.
Correspondence with reviewers: As part of independent review, the Science Support Center manages reviewer recruitment, including sending invitations, reminders, follow-up about timelines, thank-you emails, etc., and responding to any questions or concerns reviewers may have.
Customizable online software: The Science Support Center is experienced in configuring software to meet the specific needs of different review processes, including multiple levels of editor review; stages of internal review before, during, and after external review; collection of authorship forms; conflict of interest procedures; exportation of manuscripts to a publisher; review of revisions; and other features that can be custom developed with each group or journal.

Translational Health Communication

The SSC is adept at targeting health science information to a broad array of audiences, from patients to clinician researchers, policymakers, and health system leaders. In the past three years, SSC staff have crafted documents for VA executives, through the ESP program; assisted in the development of reporting procedures guidance for the AHRQ EPC program; and provided editorial assistance in the development of online patient-centered medical story-sharing for the HERN.

Data Visualization

As the Scientific Resource Center (SRC) for the AHRQ EPC program, the SSC is leading the way in the development of web-based data visualizations of AHRQ EPC reports, helping the Agency define and implement its data visualization strategies. (Our paper in Research Synthesis Methods can be found here.)

As a subcontractor to the Research Triangle Institute, we also provided data visualization for PCORI's comparison of prostate cancer treatments, using both Tableau and D3 open source technologies.

[Example] Search Results Before and After Publication

(see animated inclusion/exclusion by year)

Web Development

While many of the SSC's web development projects are proprietary and exist behind password protected security, public sites include the PCORI peer review recruitment portal and the VA ESP compendium of systematic reviews on COVID-19.

For more information, email or call 503-273-5261