Healthcare innovation survey highlights funding, support and time constraints

A new study from IO Lab identifies funding, community support and time as common barriers reported by people working in healthcare innovation. Published in Nature Biotechnology, the survey examines how clinicians, investors, industry professionals and other participants view the conditions needed to develop new technologies. The findings show shared concerns alongside differences between professional groups.

Arya Rao and colleagues conducted a 25-question survey from August through October 2024. Invitations went to approximately 72,000 contacts, and 277 people completed the questionnaire. Respondents included clinicians and investigators, technology-transfer professionals, investors and people working in industry. Questions covered obstacles, institutional support and expectations for the field.

Funding was reported as a barrier by 70% of respondents. Community support followed at 55%, and time at 49%. Smaller proportions selected being early in a career or lacking ideas. Within this group, the results suggest that developing an idea depends heavily on access to resources and people who can help move the work forward.

Responses also differed by professional role. Lack of expertise was reported by 72% of investors, compared with 29% of clinicians and investigators. Investors were particularly likely to identify insufficient community support. Those differences suggest that a single program may need to address several kinds of practical difficulty, even when participants share an interest in bringing new technologies into healthcare.

The survey also asked about expectations for innovation. Many respondents expressed optimism over a longer horizon. Those views describe participants’ outlook and should be interpreted alongside the barriers they reported. Confidence in the field’s future does not establish that a particular technology will succeed or that an institution has already resolved the problems identified.

The response rate was approximately 0.4%, which substantially limits how broadly the findings can be applied. Participants chose to respond from an innovation-related contact network. Their experiences may differ from those of people outside that network or those who did not answer. The survey measures perceptions and reported obstacles, not the causal effects of a funding or training intervention.

For organizations building innovation programs, the results offer subjects for closer local investigation. Leaders can ask where teams encounter funding gaps, which expertise is difficult to access and how clinical responsibilities affect project time. Testing specific changes and following their outcomes would help determine whether those supports improve the development of useful healthcare technologies.