Month: June 2018

BCBS Massachusetts Foundation Accepting Applications for Special Healthcare Initiatives

The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation, through its Special Initiatives program,  is offering one-year grants of up to $50,000 in support of innovative initiatives in Massachusetts designed to expand access to health care for low-income consumers and that complement the objectives of the foundation’s other grant programs. Preference will be given to programs focused on protecting the availability of coverage and care for the most vulnerable people in the state and/or that support linkages between social services and health care that help to improve outcomes for residents. Grants are one-time and non-renewable.

To be eligible, applicants must be based in Massachusetts and be tax exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code. Priority will be given to organizations that primarily serve low-income and vulnerable people, particularly individuals receiving MassHealth or other subsidized health insurance. The foundation does not fund for-profit companies, religious organizations, or individuals.

Letters of Intent must be received no later than August 17, 2018.

See the BCBS Massachusetts Foundation website for complete program guidelines and application instructions.

Dr. Jacquelyn Taylor: “Hypertension Genomics in Black Families: A Tale of 3 Studies, and Counting…”

On May 22, Dr. Jacquelyn Taylor presented the second 2018 NINR Director’s Lecture on the NIH Campus in Bethesda, Maryland. In her presentation, “Hypertension Genomics in Black Families: A Tale of 3 Studies, and Counting…” Dr. Taylor described her research trajectory and current program of research, which addresses the genomics of chronic disease in African Americans.

About the Speaker

Jacquelyn Taylor, PhD, RN, PNP-BC, FAHA, FAAN is the inaugural Vernice D. Ferguson Endowed Professor in Health Equity at the Rory Meyers College of Nursing at New York University.

Dr. Taylor’s work focuses on the genomics of chronic disease among African-American populations. Her current research examines the effect of psychological, genetic, and epigenetic factors on blood pressure in Black/African-American women and their young children. Dr. Taylor is also conducting a study on the genomics of lead poisoning in Flint, Michigan.

Helping to End Addiction Long-term (HEAL) Initiative

The HEAL Initiative is a trans-NIH effort launched in April 2018 to advance national priorities in addressing the opioid crisis through science. It has a focus on two primary areas – improving treatments for opioid misuse and addiction, and enhancing strategies for pain management.

Continue reading “Helping to End Addiction Long-term (HEAL) Initiative”

NINR Precision Health: Smart Technologies, Smart Health Symposium

Date: Monday, July 23, 2018
Time: 11:45am – 5:00pm
Location: Master Auditorium (Building 10), NIH Campus, 9000 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, Maryland 20892

The event will be streamed and archived here for on demand public viewing. Registration is not required to watch the videocast. For additional inquiries, please email NINRIRPtraining@mail.nih.gov.

This symposium and poster session will engage and inform participants on the latest advances in digital health data and technologies that enable “smart health” and improved patient outcomes. The symposium will include three scientific panels on:

  • PTSD Nurses Toolkit for the Military Community’s Mental Health Needs
    Nancy P. Hanrahan, PhD, RN, FAAN Dean & Professor, School of Nursing; Senior Associate Dean of Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Bouve College of Health Sciences School of Nursing
  • Tools to Facilitate Cancer Patient-Provider Discussions of Symptom and Quality of Life Issues
    Donna Berry, PhD, RN, AOCN, FAAN Associate Professor, Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Director, Phyllis F. Cantor Center for Research in Nursing & Patient Care Services, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
  • Self-monitoring of Diet and Exercise in Behavioral Weight Loss Interventions
    Lora Burke, PhD, MPH, RN, SBM, FAHA, FAAN Professor, Epidemiology Health & Community Systems University of Pittsburgh School of Nursing

In-Person Attendance:
This event is free, but space is limited, and registration is required to attend in person. A poster session follows the symposium. Participants will present their research related to digital health, mobile technology, wearables, sensors, virtual/augmented reality, or molecular omics science (e.g., genomics, microbiome, gene expression, proteomics, metabolomics).

NIH Director’s Transformative Research Award

Part of the High-Risk, High-Reward Research program, the award supports individuals or teams proposing transformative projects that are inherently risky and untested but have the potential to create or overturn fundamental paradigms and may require very large budgets.

  • Open to all career stages
  • Open to individuals or teams
  • No preliminary data required
  • No limits to budget
  • Effort commensurate to project needs
  • Clinical research proposals should follow NIH institute-specific guidelines

Full details of the announcement can be found here.

NIH Releases Strategic Plan for Data Science

The National Institutes of Health has released its first Strategic Plan for Data Science that provides a roadmap for modernizing the NIH-funded biomedical data science ecosystem.  Over the course of the next year, NIH will begin implementing its strategy, with some elements of the plan already underway. NIH will continue to seek community input during the implementation phase.

Accessible, well-organized, secure, and efficiently operated data resources are critical to modern scientific inquiry. By maximizing the value of data generated through NIH-funded efforts, the pace of biomedical discoveries and medical breakthroughs for better health outcomes can be substantially accelerated. To keep pace with rapid changes in biomedical data science, NIH will work to address the:

  • findability, interconnectivity, and interoperability of NIH-funded biomedical data sets and resources
  • integration of existing data management tools and development of new ones
  • universalizing innovative algorithms and tools created by academic scientists into enterprise-ready resources that meet industry standards of ease of use and efficiency of operation
  • growing costs of data management

Further information can be found here.

Save the Date: Western Massachusetts Health Equity Summit

Save the date for the Western Massachusetts Health Equity Network’s 2018 Summit, organized by the School of Public Health and Health Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Friday, September 14, 2018
UMass Amherst Campus Center
8:30am – 3.30pm
Registration will open July 1 (http://www.umass.edu/sphhs/wmhen)