Health Research Alliance: A National Organization Fostering Links Between Reseearch and Practice

Bulletin:

Health Research Alliance members:
Check your calendar now to make sure you have reserved the dates for the spring, 2011 Members' Meeting: April 12-13, 2012, at the Liberty Hotel in Boston. Many thanks to our co-hosts: The Donaghue Foundation, the New York Stem Cell Foundation and The Medical Foundation, a division of Health Resources in Action. Expect to receive registration information by email in early February.
Health Research Alliance members: It is not too early to mark your calendars for the fall, 2012 Members' Meeting! The meeting has been scheduled for September 6-7, 2012, and will be hosted by The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland.
Is your organization interested in becoming a member of the Health Research Alliance? Find out more.
Health Research Alliance
P.O. Box 13901
21 T. W. Alexander Drive
Research Triangle Park,
North Carolina 27709
An initial key project of the Health Research Alliance was the creation of the first comprehensive repository of health research awards made by non-governmental, not-for-profit grantmakers. The inaugural report from the "Grants in the Health Research Alliance Shared Portfolio" database (gHRAsp) will be released to the public in CY 2011, covering grants from thirty-two member organizations starting in calendar years 2006 - 2008.

The need for the database was recognized in the late 1990's when the predecessor of the Health Research Alliance, the Clinical Research Alliance, attempted to quantify the investment of the private, not-for-profit sector in the career development of clinical investigators. Obtaining such information currently requires an extensive search of myriad websites. The new database will pull this information together in one location.

gHRAsp is searchable using standard search tools, and organizations participating in the database are required to update their information annually. The new database should be of interest to policymakers (example: to examine the scope of the financial commitment by non-governmental not-for-profit grantmakers in the area of clinical cancer research in a given year), applicants and awardees (example: to view examples of clinical research awards made by different grantmakers), and grantmaking organizations themselves (example: to examine how many privately-funded grantees are conducting research in cancer genomics).

The early development of gHRAsp was under the auspices of the American Cancer Society, with leadership provided by T.J. Koerner, Ph.D., Director of Research Information Management. In 2008, the HRA Board of Directors selected Innolyst to implement and provide additional enhancements to the database. The further development of gHRAsp is overseen by the gHRAsp Oversight Committee, composed of representatives of member organizations.