Objective To investigate the attitudes and its influencing factors of the medical staff at a tertiary maternal and child health hospital toward the status of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) project application, in order to provide reference and inspiration for similar medical institutions in terms of relevant application work.

Methods A self-designed electronic questionnaire was used to survey 776 medical staff of a tertiary maternal and child health hospital, all of whom were on duty. The questionnaire included basic information, scientific research experience, attitudes toward the NSFC program, factors affecting the filing of applications, and filing intentions. Simultaneously, scientific research data from the tertiary maternal and child health hospital from March 2010 to January 2024 were collected, including data related to the NSFC project, to analyze the correlation between the variables.

Results Among the 776 medical personnel surveyed, 13.8% had a master’s degree or higher, and 12.4% had an associate degree or higher. A total of 14 personnel were responsible for or participated in national-level scientific research projects, accounting for 1.8% of the respondents. 75.8% of the respondents did not participate in any level of scientific research projects. Those who had not published papers as the first or corresponding authors accounted for 65.5% of the respondents. Since this tertiary maternal and child health hospital organized medical staff to apply for the NSFC project since 2021, a total of 10 applications for the project were made, but only one was approved. The survey results showed that only 34.8% of the respondents expressed an active and strong desire to apply for NSFC projects. The top 5 influencing factors for declaring this fund program were: insufficient reserve of their own knowledge (score 7.73); very insufficient personal experience and lack of confidence (score 6.41); work being too tiring and unwilling to apply for it (score 5.18); too hard to apply the NSFC program (score 2.92); lack of scientific research safeguard and incentive mechanism (score 2.57).

Conclusion The willingness of medical staff at this maternal and child health hospital to declare the NSFC project is low, and the application situation is unsatisfactory. Some medical staff lack the ability and motivation to transform clinical experience into scientific research problems. It is suggested that medical staff should actively improve their academic qualifications and titles, and actively participate in scientific research activities to enhance the synergistic effect of clinical and scientific research. At the same time, the research management department should improve the incentive mechanism to increase the willingness to apply and stimulate the enthusiasm for research.