Key Dates

Related Announcements

NOT-CA-21-089 -Notice of Correction to the Response Date for NOT-CA-087

Issued by

National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Purpose

Diet, physical activity, and sleep are lifestyle and behavioral factors that play a role in the etiology and prevention of many chronic diseases, including cancer, coronary heart disease, as well as overweight/obesity, weight loss/maintenance, and body composition. Temporally aligned data on these behaviors is critical to understand how they may impact health and functional status over the lifespan, making them key variables to assess over the 24-hour period for surveillance, epidemiological, behavioral, and clinical research purposes. Researchers are increasingly recognizing the advantage of collectively examining diet, physical activity, sedentary behavior, and sleep patterns together and how they interact to facilitate or constrain one another. Integrating measures for these behaviors may thus aid the exploration of multidimensional and dynamic behavior patterns that influence disease risk, treatment, and survival.

Often, studies do not collect detailed 24-hour data on these three behaviors together or only include detailed data on one or two of these behaviors. For example, a dataset may include actigraphy data on physical activity and sleep but collect usual dietary intake estimates via a food frequency questionnaire or diet screener; 24-hour recall data may be collected for diet but questionnaires used for physical activity and sleep may only assess average behaviors over the past month; or data for one or more of these behaviors may be missing. However, wearable devices that measure aspects of physical activity and sleep are becoming increasingly available. Innovative methods combining self-report methods with device-based images, movement sensors, geospatial data, and/or time-stamped data within and across all three behaviors have the potential to create a fuller picture of the 24-hour period. Ecological momentary assessment can also be utilized to collect data on these behaviors in real time.

Identifying datasets containing detailed 24-hour diet, physical activity, and sleep measures in a similar time period can provide a better understanding of available opportunities to promote integrated predictive modeling of diet, physical activity, and sleep. Such efforts can also highlight gaps for certain age groups or subpopulations where further data collection is needed to promote future integrated research efforts.

Information Requested

This RFI is to determine the existence of datasets that capture detailed measures of diet, physical activity, and sleep. The individual-level data should be collected within a similar time period, though the behaviors are not required to have been measured in the same 24-hour period (i.e., a time lag is acceptable given the participant burden concurrent measures may require). It is important to note that datasets must include 24-hour data on all three behaviors. Additionally, this RFI is interested in identifying datasets containing data on all three behaviors at both one time point and over multiple time points (i.e., longitudinally).

The NCI is seeking information on datasets including any populations across the lifespan. Submissions should include the following information:

• Available datasets, data linkages, or consortia that can be leveraged to examine these behavioral factors together, including the dataset name(s), database URLs, etc.
• Data collection methods used for diet, physical activity, and sleep, the time points at which they were collected, and the number of days at each time point
• A description of the types of diet, physical activity, and sleep variables included in a given dataset and the sample size including these measures

Submissions may also include any or all of the following information:

• A description of any databases or algorithms used to generate diet, physical activity, and sleep variables
• A summary of study participant demographic characteristics
• A summary of the outcomes of interest collected in the dataset (including types of cancer or other health outcomes) and the duration of the study
• Examples of the types of population-based questions related to cancer risk and prognosis that can be addressed when detailed diet, physical activity, and sleep data are available
• Examples of what can be learned from studies that incorporate the modeling of the three behaviors together over time and/or consider their time variation (e.g., critical windows of susceptibility, cumulative or acute exposure)

How to Submit a Response

Responses will be accepted through August 22, 2021.

Responses are entirely voluntary and can be anonymous. If willing, you may indicate the environment to which your perspective pertains (e.g., academia, clinical research, etc.). No proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information should be included in your response. Responses should be limited to one to two page(s). Responses in electronic formats are preferred and can be e-mailed to RFAB@mail.nih.gov. Please include the Notice number (NOT-CA-21-087) in the subject line. All individual responses will remain confidential. Any identifiers (e.g., names, institutions, e-mail addresses, etc.) will be removed when responses are compiled. Only the processed, anonymized results will be shared internally with NIH staff members and any member of scientific working groups convened by the NCI, as appropriate.

Every respondent will receive an automated e-mail confirmation acknowledging receipt of a successfully submitted response but will not receive any individualized feedback.

This RFI is for information and planning purposes only and should not be construed as a solicitation or as an obligation on the part of the Federal Government, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and/or the NCI.

Inquiries

Please direct all inquiries to:

Marissa M. Shams-White, PhD, MSTOM, MS, MPH
National Cancer Institute
Telephone: 240-276-7654
Email: marissa.shams-white@nih.gov