CME Grant Writing Services

Grant writing for Continuing Medical Education (CME) meetings and academic research collaborations. Lead writer: Oren Fugón, MD-PhD.

Dr. Fugón holds an MD and a PhD in Integrative Genetics and Genomics (UC Davis, 2023). His PhD research focused on epigenetic editing in neurogenetic disease, specifically dCas9-based reactivation of the silenced paternal UBE3A allele in Angelman syndrome, co-mentored by Dr. David J. Segal and Dr. Janine LaSalle. He is Chief Science Officer at iVista Medical Education and is bilingual in English and Spanish.

He authored and received a Biogen-funded research grant at UC Davis, authored an NIH F31 predoctoral fellowship application and held two NIH T32 training-grant appointments. He is currently lead author on a multi-meeting CME proposal portfolio across retina, glaucoma, diabetic macular edema, presbyopia, ophthalmic imaging and robotic plastic surgery.

CME grant-writing portfolio, 2026 cycle

Dr. Fugón is lead author on a multi-meeting CME proposal portfolio submitted to industry funders in ophthalmology and plastic surgery. Each row below is a separate authored proposal. Each proposal includes Learning Objectives, peer-reviewed reference verification, prior-year outcomes synthesis, gaps-and-needs assessment and full assembly.

Meeting Therapeutic area
Bridging the Gap in DME Care, Real-World Outcomes (DME Bridge) 2026 Diabetic macular edema
InnovateRetina 2026 Retina
Cleveland Clinic Robotics in Plastic Surgery (CCR) 2026 Plastic surgery / robotics
Glaucoma / GOS 2026 Glaucoma
Real-World Solutions (RWS) 2026 Retina
Presbyopia 2026, Non-CE Webinar + Live CE (two-grant package) Presbyopia
Southeastern Vitreoretinal (SEVR) 2026 Vitreoretinal
Cole Eye Imaging Summit 2026 Ophthalmic imaging

The cycle covers retina, glaucoma, diabetic macular edema, presbyopia, ophthalmic imaging and robotic plastic surgery.

Industry research grant: authored and received

Biogen-supported UC Davis research grant

Dr. Fugón wrote the full Biogen-supported research grant at UC Davis, co-mentored by Dr. David J. Segal and Dr. Janine LaSalle. The grant was awarded. The project was funded.

Authorship covered specific aims, research strategy and rationale, milestones, budget and the progress-reporting framework. Files on record include the proposal draft, the first progress report and the budget workbook.

Peer-reviewed publications

Two peer-reviewed publications from the UC Davis research period. Both are open access. Dr. Fugón is published as Gutierrez Fugón OJ.

First author, 2024

Gutierrez Fugón OJ, Sharifi O, Heath N, Soto DC, Gomez JA, Yasui DH, Mendiola AJP, O’Geen H, Beitnere U, Tomkova M, Haghani V, Dillon G, Segal DJ, LaSalle JM. Integration of CTCF loops, methylome, and transcriptome in differentiating LUHMES as a model for imprinting dynamics of the 15q11-q13 locus in human neurons. Human Molecular Genetics. 2024, 33(19), 1711–1725. doi:10.1093/hmg/ddae111

Read at Oxford Academic  ·  DOI

Co-author, 2022

Zhu Y, Gomez JA, Laufer BI, Mordaunt CE, Mouat JS, Soto DC, Dennis MY, Benke KS, Bakulski KM, Dou J, Marathe R, Jianu JM, Williams LA, Gutierrez Fugón OJ, Walker CK, Ozonoff S, Daniels J, Grosvenor LP, Volk HE, Feinberg JI, Fallin MD, Hertz-Picciotto I, Schmidt RJ, Yasui DH, LaSalle JM. Placental methylome reveals a 22q13.33 brain regulatory gene locus associated with autism. Genome Biology. 2022, 23, 46. doi:10.1186/s13059-022-02613-1

Read at Genome Biology  ·  DOI

NIH fellowship and training-grant credentials

NIH F31 predoctoral fellowship (authored)

Dr. Fugón authored and submitted an NIH F31 / NRSA predoctoral fellowship application at UC Davis. The submission package included the research strategy, specific aims, biosketch materials and the full assembled e-submission. Submission documents are on file.

The F31 was submitted. It wasn’t awarded.

UC Davis NIH T32 training-grant appointments

Two NIH predoctoral T32 appointments at UC Davis:

  • NIH MCB T32 in Molecular and Cellular Biology, UC Davis. Accepted 2018, extended 2019.
  • NIH EHS T32 in Environmental Health Sciences, UC Davis. Awarded 2018, declined after accepting the MCB T32.

These are competitive trainee appointments on institutional T32 mechanisms, not investigator-initiated research grants.

Pipeline and undergraduate training awards

  • NIH IMSD Trainee, 2017
  • NIH MARC Scholar, 2015
  • NIH MHIRT, King’s College London, 2015
  • NIH Bridges to Baccalaureate, UC Irvine, 2014
  • NSF URM, 2014

How the work gets done

Learning Objectives and needs framing

Sharp, scoped Learning Objectives tied to documented practice gaps. The gaps-and-needs narrative comes from peer-reviewed literature, professional-society guidance and prior-cycle outcomes data. Not boilerplate.

Reference discipline

Citations are NLM-formatted and full-text verified. Every reference gets audited for industry-sponsor bias. If a citation can’t be independently verified, it gets cut.

Outcomes synthesis

For repeat meetings, prior-cycle outcomes go into the next proposal: knowledge gains, competence shifts and patient-level outcomes where the data exists. The next cycle is positioned against measured impact, not projected impact.

Reviewer-pass revision

Drafts get revised in successive reviewer passes. Each pass is checked for what an external grant reviewer would flag: scope creep, weak rationale, unverifiable claims, undefined acronyms, inflated outcomes. Some meetings hit 15 to 24 documented versions before submission.

Budget and outcomes reporting

CME proposal budgets get line-item reviewed before submission. Post-program outcomes reports use the same reference-discipline checks as the proposal itself: every figure independently verified.

Capability summary

  • Industry research grants written end to end (Biogen / UC Davis, funded)
  • NIH F31 fellowship application authorship
  • NIH T32 training-grant appointment materials
  • Scientific narratives: specific aims, research strategy, gaps narratives
  • Peer-reviewed reference sourcing and verification (NLM, full-text verification, sponsor-bias audit)
  • Budget coordination for industry-academic collaborations
  • Progress reports for industry-academic collaborations
  • Multi-meeting CME proposal authorship at scale
  • Peer-reviewed publication record (first-author and co-author, UC Davis era)

Start a CME proposal

Scope ranges from a single CME meeting proposal to a full multi-meeting cycle. Work can be full proposal authorship or any individual piece: Learning Objectives, gaps-and-needs narrative, peer-reviewed reference sourcing and verification, reviewer-pass revision, budget line-item review, outcomes report drafting.

Contact: ofugon@ivistameded.com  ·  Download CV (PDF)

Replies usually within a few business days.