MedStar Selected by the CDC for the SHEPherRD Program

MedStar Health Research Institute (MHRI) was awarded membership to the second cohort of the Safe Healthcare, Epidemiology, and Prevention Research Development (SHEPheRD) Program funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). MHRI is one of a select group of organizational members of this cohort.

SHEPheRD was developed as an indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract to provide CDC a mechanism to collaborate with healthcare systems, academic, and other research partners to perform research and quality improvement projects. Membership is divided into eight specific research areas, ranging from adverse event research protocol development to healthcare information technology development to advanced molecular epidemiology and microbial community analysis. Membership into specific area domains qualifies MHRI investigators to bid as the prime contractor on CDC-released task orders.

MHRI was awarded membership into “Acute Inpatient Care Quality Improvement and Research Implementation Infrastructure”, as one of only four organizations. As part of this award, MHRI has partnered with Abt Associates, a research organization specializing in large-scale data collection, evaluation, and analysis of health problems, policies, and programs. This award also leveraged MedStar’s academic partnership with Georgetown University to access the expertise of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law in assessing legal and policy interventions as related to the impact of infection control interventions.

In addition, MHRI is also a partner on the Abt Associates SHEPheRD award under “Healthcare-associated infection (HAI) and Other Adverse Healthcare Event Prevention Research Protocol Development and Implementation”. Membership under this specific domain allows Abt Associates to bid as the prime contractor on CDC-released task orders that will focus on successfully answering research questions posed by CDC, including study design, protocol development, database development, statistical support, background literature review, study implementation, and data management and analysis services. If interested, MHRI investigators could be investigators and collaborators under SHEPheRD proposals submitted by either MHRI or Abt Associates.

Across the entire SHEPheRD program, including all domains, CDC will fund projects totaling up to $200M over five years. For more information, contact [email protected].