A key aspect of reducing new knowledge to practice in the field of medicine is successfully navigating the process of patenting inventions and licensing them to facilitate their use. University faculty and their departments have much to gain from a detailed understanding of how this is done because even small deviations in laboratory practice, documentation, or execution of the process may completely negate possible benefits. Here we describe good laboratory practice for documentation of medical research, the process of patenting intellectual property, and its potential impact on faculty and their departments. As the field of medicine rapidly changes, faculty and their departments who are knowledgeable about these issues will be best positioned to see their ideas converted into treatments for disease.