Key Dates

Related Announcements

None

Issued by

National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA)

Purpose

This Notice is a Request for Information (RFI) inviting feedback on an outline for the NIAAA Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years (FYs) 2022-2026.

NOTE:It is important to read this entire RFI notice to ensure an adequate response is prepared and to have a full understanding of how your response will be utilized.

Background

The mission of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) is to generate and disseminate fundamental knowledge about the effects of alcohol on health and well-being, and apply that knowledge to improve diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of alcohol-related problems, including alcohol use disorder, across the lifespan. NIAAA is the world’s largest funder of alcohol research.

NIAAA is currently developing an updated strategic plan to highlight priorities and guide activities for advancing the Institute’s mission over the next five years.

Information Requested

NIAAA seeks comments on the draft outline for its FY 2022-2026 Strategic Plan from diverse stakeholders, including scientific experts, health care providers, patients and family members, advocacy groups, other federal agencies, and non-governmental scientific, professional, and healthcare organizations. We encourage organizations to submit a single response reflecting input from their organization as a whole.

All respondents are encouraged to preview the online response form to help organize their comments.

NIAAA 2022-2026 Strategic Plan Outline

Cross-cutting themes

Describes research programs, priorities, and approaches that span across multiple scientific goals

• Promote health equity and enhance diversity and inclusion in the alcohol research enterprise
  • Address disparities in the prevalence, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of alcohol-related conditionsin vulnerable or underserved populations, including ethnic and racial minority groups, women, people with disabilities, sexual and gender minority groups, rural andeconomically disadvantaged populations, incarcerated populations
  • Apply health disparities research findings toward development of novel basic research hypotheses (e.g., in priority areas including adversity and other social variables)
  • Increase diversity in the scientific and administrative workforce and improve support for underrepresented researchers at all career levels

• Characterize unique risks for and outcomes of alcohol misuse across the lifespan
• Advance research on co-occurring conditions that interact with alcohol misuse

• Encourage “whole person” approach to health (refers to the integration of diagnosis, prevention, treatment of and recovery from alcohol-related conditions across all aspects of care)
• Support development and integration of innovative technology to improve diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of alcohol-related conditions
• Capture individual differences in diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of alcohol-related conditions to identify opportunities to advance precision medicine
• Increase use of data science approachesto advance alcohol research
• Promote collaborative science to leverage resources and to integrate alcohol topics into other health research

Goal 1: Identify and track the biological, social, environmental, and behavioral causes and consequences of alcohol misuse

• Elucidate the basicbiological and neurobiologicalmechanisms of alcohol-related action and pathophysiology in the brain and body

• Track and characterize the burden of alcohol misuse
• Capture individual risk factors that confer vulnerability and resilience to alcohol misuse

Goal 2: Prevent and reduce alcohol misuse and associated developmental effects, health conditions, and acute harms

• Improve interventionsto prevent and reduce alcohol misuse across the lifespan (including efforts to reduce prenatal alcohol exposure) and in different settings
• Determine the impact of policies on alcohol misuse and health effects and acute harms (e.g., intentional and unintentional injuries and deaths)
• Facilitate increased use of evidenced-based preventive interventions, including through the development and promotion of science-based resource

Goal 3:Advance diagnosis and treatment of alcohol-related conditions

• Improve early diagnosisand treatment interventionsfor FASD
• Refine diagnosis and behavioral and pharmacological treatment of AUD
• Enhance understanding of the complex nature of recovery from AUD, including factors that facilitate sustained recovery
• Advance diagnosis and treatment for alcohol-associated liver disease (ALD) and other alcohol-associated chronic health conditions
• Facilitate integration of AUD diagnosis, treatment, and recovery strategies in primary, emergency, and specialty care (e.g., hepatology)

How to Submit a Response

Responses to this RFI must be submitted through this online form.

To ensure full consideration, responses must be received by July 30, 2021.

Responses to this RFI are voluntary. Do not include any proprietary, classified, confidential, trade secret, or sensitive information in your response. The responses will be reviewed by NIAAA staff, and individual feedback will not be provided to any responder. The U.S. Government will use the information submitted in response to this RFI at its discretion.

This RFI is for information and planning purposes only and shall not be construed as a solicitation, grant, or cooperative agreement, or as an obligation on the part of the Federal Government, the NIH, or NIAAA to provide support for any ideas identified in response to it. The Government will not pay for the preparation of any information submitted or for the U.S. Government’s use of such information. No basis for claims against the U.S. Government shall arise as a result of a response to this request for information or from the Government’s use of such information. The provided information will be analyzed and may appear, in summary form, removing personally identifying or sensitive information, in reports or other publicly accessible resources.

Inquiries

Please direct all inquiries to:

NIAAA Strategic Planning Team
National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism
Email: NIAAASciencePolicyBranch@nih.gov