Grants & You Summer 2020: News & Updates

The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) is launching its year-long effort to develop a new strategic plan to guide research over the next 5 years (2021 – 2026). The plan is centered on strengthening a consideration of “whole person” health with research on multimodal approaches to care.

Request for Information

The NCCIH issued a Request for Information to help identify research areas and topics to be included in the new strategic plan, seeking perspectives as they relate to:

• Emerging research needs and opportunities.

• Research needs and opportunities articulated in the 2016 strategic plan that should be modified because of progress over the past 5 years.

• Challenges or barriers to progress in research on complementary and integrative health approaches and their roles in improving health and healthcare.

• Gaps and opportunities across the research continuum from basic through clinical studies, including real-world studies.

• Gaps and opportunities in considering whole person health and the relationships among numerous factors, including biologic, environmental, behavioral, mental, and social factors, in determining health.

Responses will be accepted until July 13, 2020.

June 5 Virtual Open Session

The public at large, as well as NCCIH grantees, potential applicants, and other stakeholders, were invited to attend the virtual open session of the June 5, 2020 meeting of the National Advisory Council for Complementary and Integrative Health. The session was recorded and is available here.

In addition, an Online Public Town Hall is scheduled for July 1, 2020.

AACOM provided comments and recommendations to NIH on the NIH FY 20 appropriations law, which recognizes the importance of enhancing NIH research funding for osteopathic medical schools. AACOM:

• Strongly encouraged NIH to support research opportunities for and partner with community-based institutions.
• Emphasized the importance of evidence-based research for integrative health approaches, notably osteopathic manipulative treatment or osteopathic manipulative medicine and the role it can play in serving as a critical approach to addressing medical and musculoskeletal conditions.
• Identified future opportunities and emerging trans-NIH needs.

​AACOM will remain engaged with NIH throughout the development of the FY 2021 – 2025 strategic plan, which is expected to be released at the end of the year.

Since becoming editor-in-chief of Academic Medicine in January 2020, Laura Roberts, MD, has set out to extend the scholarly journal’s reach and relevance. She assembled a broad and diverse editorial leadership team; published editorials on such topics as holistic admissions processes, motivations for academic writing, and belonging and diversity in the health professions; and drew more than 400 submissions from trainees with her call for letters about “first experiences in training.”

Dr. Roberts recently spoke with AAMCNews about her vision for the journal. Find the condensed conversation here.

The Advisory Committee to the NIH Director’s Working Group on Changing the Culture to End Sexual Harassment identified 2 critical loopholes in need of attention. NIH expects to be informed if an institution requests:

• Approval to remove a principal investigator or other senior key person named in the grant award due to concerns about safety and/or the work environment (e.g., harassment, bullying, retaliation, or hostile working conditions).
• A change of recipient institution and concerns exist about safety and/or work environment involving the principal investigator.

The NIH Center for Scientific Review will conduct all summer peer review meetings using video, telephone, or web-based discussion.

Video meetings will occur via a FedRAMP-certified version of Zoom within the zoomgov.com domain. This version meets requirements for other agencies that handle very sensitive information, including the Department of Homeland Security. FedRAMP certification ensures the platform can be used without risking installation of malware for reviewers and ao meetings remain confidential for applicants.

The Open Mike blog describes a case of falsified credentials in job and grant applications inspired by a true story. Read the full post here.

Quick facts about the NIH FY 2019 spending shared on the Open Mike blog:

• Total FY 2019 budget = $39.2 billion
• $29.466 billion was awarded to 55,012 new and renewed meritorious extramural grants. This investment was up $2.354 billion from FY 2018 (8.68% increase), with 2,369 more grants funded (4.50% increase).
• 2,738 organizations received awards—ranging from academic universities, hospitals, small businesses, and others—throughout the US and internationally.

eRA moved to 2-factor authentication via login.gov. Log-in now requires something you know (password) and something you have (a phone or other device). This new log-in method was made available starting April 8, 2020 for users of eRA Commons, Commons Mobile, IAR, and ASSIST.

NIH and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality are reminding the biomedical and health services research communities of changes to forms and instructions for research training grant, fellowship, and career development award applications for due dates on or after May 25, 2020.

The changes encompass the following areas:

• Training in techniques for rigorous and reproducible research
• Training in relevant quantitative and data science approaches
• Training data tables
• Progress reporting for renewal applications
• Required letters for applications to selected programs