Leveraging Electronic Health Records for Alcohol Services Research (R21/R33) | PAR 17 071

Opportunity Information: Apply for PAR 17 071

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding opportunity titled "Leveraging Electronic Health Records for Alcohol Services Research (R21/R33)" (PAR-17-071; CFDA 93.273) supports pragmatic, low-cost health services research focused on improving the treatment of alcohol use disorders (AUD) in real-world clinical settings. The core idea is to use data that are already being generated through routine care rather than building expensive, stand-alone research data collection systems. Projects funded under this announcement are expected to rely heavily on electronic clinical records and related digital sources, with the goal of answering novel and practically useful questions about how AUD care is delivered, how it can be improved, and what limits or enables the effective use of electronic data for AUD services research.

A defining feature of this opportunity is its emphasis on leveraging existing electronic resources as the primary backbone for the study. Applicants are encouraged to draw from patient registries, electronic health records (EHRs), clinical data warehouses, billing and claims data, pharmacy records, and administrative records. While additional data sources can be used to supplement these electronic records, the expectation is that most of the key study variables and outcomes will be obtained directly from routine documentation and operational systems. In practice, that means proposals should be designed to fit within the workflow and data environment of healthcare delivery organizations, minimizing burdensome new data collection and focusing instead on extracting, organizing, validating, and analyzing information that already exists in clinical systems.

The research questions must have direct relevance to improving clinical care for patients with AUD. This can include understanding how patients are identified and diagnosed in routine practice, how evidence-based treatments are initiated and sustained, how care varies across settings or populations, how follow-up and continuity are managed, and how outcomes are tracked over time. Importantly, the opportunity is not only about generating findings on AUD treatment services; it is also intended to advance the field's understanding of how useful EHRs and related electronic records are for this kind of research, and what barriers remain. Applicants are therefore expected to contribute insights into practical issues such as data quality, missing or inconsistent documentation, variation in coding practices, challenges linking data across systems, privacy and governance constraints, and the feasibility of using EHR-based measures to assess processes and outcomes in AUD care.

The mechanism is listed as R21/R33, which generally indicates a phased approach where an initial exploratory or development phase (R21) can transition into a more expanded implementation or effectiveness phase (R33) if predefined milestones are met. In the context of EHR-based AUD services research, this structure fits projects that need an early period to establish data pipelines, validate measures, confirm feasibility, or pilot analytic strategies before scaling up to a larger pragmatic study. The overall framing of the announcement makes clear that NIH is looking for studies that are efficient and grounded in routine care, rather than highly controlled trials requiring substantial new infrastructure.

Eligibility is broad and includes many types of U.S.-based organizations: state, county, and city or township governments; special district governments; independent school districts; public and state-controlled institutions of higher education; private institutions of higher education; federally recognized Native American tribal governments; Native American tribal organizations other than federally recognized tribal governments; public housing authorities and Indian housing authorities; nonprofits with and without 501(c)(3) status; for-profit organizations (other than small businesses); small businesses; and other eligible entities. The announcement also explicitly highlights additional eligible applicant categories such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Hispanic-serving institutions, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, and Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISISs), as well as faith-based or community-based organizations, regional organizations, eligible federal agencies, and U.S. territories or possessions. At the same time, it places strict limits on foreign involvement: non-U.S. (foreign) institutions are not eligible to apply, non-U.S. components of U.S. organizations are not eligible, and foreign components (as defined by NIH policy) are not allowed.

Administrative details provided in the source information include an original closing date of January 24, 2018, and a creation date of December 8, 2016. The opportunity is categorized as a discretionary grant in the health area. Although the provided excerpt does not specify an award ceiling or the expected number of awards, the repeated emphasis on "low-cost" and "pragmatic" projects signals that NIH is prioritizing efficient studies that maximize the value of existing electronic clinical data to produce actionable evidence for improving AUD treatment in everyday healthcare environments.

• The National Institutes of Health in the health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Leveraging Electronic Health Records for Alcohol Services Research (R21/R33)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.273.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2016-12-08.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2018-01-24. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For-profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others.

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