Background: Investment in research, including clinical research, has positive effects both on health of a population and economic growth of a country. Several factors have been suggested as being related to the performance of clinical research. The goal of this work was to develop and perform initial validation of a survey that measures both current research involvement of physicians, as well as previously noted factors and additional informatics factors affecting this involvement. The survey was developed in both English and Spanish with the goal of its use in Latin America.

Methods: The initial survey was developed primarily from experience with other validated surveys developed for similar purposes. It was validated in three stages with modification or elimination of questions as indicated by this testing.

Results: The final survey contains 33 questions in the categories of research experience, education in research, environmental factors, computer experience, and collaboration.