Key Dates

Related Announcements

• April 24, 2024 - NIH Pathway to Independence Award (Parent K99/R00 – Independent Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PA-24-193
• April 24, 2024 - NIH Pathway to Independence Award (Parent K99/R00 – Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-24-194:  
• April 24, 2024 - Mentored Research Scientist Development Award (Parent K01 - Independent Clinical Trial Required. See NOFO PA-24-175
• April 24, 2024 - Mentored Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award (Parent K08 – Independent Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PA-24-181:
• April 24, 2024 - Mentored Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award (Parent K08 - Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-24-182
• April 24, 2024 - Mentored Research Scientist Development Award (Parent K01 – Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PA-24-176
• April 9, 2024 - Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award (Parent K23 - Independent Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PA-24-184
• April 9, 2024 - Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award (Parent K23 - Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed. See NOFO PA-24-185
• January 13, 2023 - Innovative Pilot Mental Health Services Research Not Involving Clinical Trials (R34 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-23-105.
• January 6, 2023 - Innovative Mental Health Services Research Not Involving Clinical Trials (R01 Clinical Trials Not Allowed). See NOFO PAR-23-095.
• March 2, 2021 - Clinical Trials to Test the Effectiveness of Treatment, Preventive, and Services Interventions (R01Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PAR-21-130.
• March 2, 2021 - Pilot Effectiveness Trials for Treatment, Preventive and Services Interventions (R34 -Clinical Trial Required). See NOFO PAR-21-131.

Issued by

National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)

Purpose

The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is issuing this Notice of Special Interest (NOSI) to encourage applications that investigate the development and delivery of screening methods for subthreshold and diagnosable eating disorders in naturalistic settings for children, adolescents, and adults. An emphasis is placed on research that seeks to develop and test low-burden, feasible screening methods, addresses inequities in detection among populations with health disparities, utilizes existing setting staff and/or lay/alternate providers to aid in screening efforts, aims to quantify the resources necessary to implement these approaches, and/or proposes to identify and address factors that hinder/facilitate implementation and scale-up.

Background

An estimated 30 million Americans meet criteria for an eating disorder (ED) during their lifetime. Eating disorders are associated with comorbid mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety, and substance use disorder, significant functional impairments, and premature mortality due to both the physical consequences as well as heightened rates of death by suicide; rates of suicide are 18 times higher among persons with anorexia nervosa, and 7 times higher among persons with bulimia nervosa, than the general population. These poor outcomes are due in part to a significant delay between the onset of symptoms and the receipt of an eating disorder diagnosis and treatment. This delay is greatest among racial and ethnic minorities, and increases the likelihood for all affected individuals that an eating disorder will become a chronic condition that is less responsive to treatment. Despite these considerable risks, research on the identification and treatment of eating disorders is limited.

Effective eating disorder screening is an essential step in the ultimate development of evidence-based care pathways that provide accessible early detection, prevention, and treatment services for individuals of all ages, including those who are members of minoritized and traditionally underserved populations. While eating disorders can emerge at any point across the lifespan, the majority occur before the age of 25 and subthreshold symptoms are often present during childhood, highlighting the need for screening across all stages of development. Historically, within the United States, White females, sexual and gender minorities, and individuals with physical disabilities have had the highest reported rates of eating disorders. However, evidence suggests that eating disorders have been chronically underidentified among populations with health disparities, and that the true prevalence rates within the underserved and understudied groups may be equivalent to those observed among White individuals.

Naturalistic settings (i.e., primary care and specialty medical settings, schools, universities, and other community settings) provide an opportunity for conducting routine eating disorder screening in non-stigmatizing, widely accessible contexts. Currently, screening for eating disorders is uncommon in these settings due to a lack of culturally valid screening tools, scarce resources (i.e., available personnel and physical space), inadequate staff and provider knowledge, and privacy concerns. As a result, little is known about the effectiveness of eating disorder screening in naturalistic settings.

Research Objectives 

This NOSI aims to address these gaps by encouraging research that aligns with Objectives 4.1 and 4.3 of the NIMH Strategic Plan for Research and seeks to develop and test the implementation of eating disorder screening approaches in naturalistic settings. NIMH is committed to supporting research that reduces disparities and advances equity in mental health interventions, services, and outcomes. Accordingly, this NOSI encourages research that seeks to reduce disparities in detection for populations with health disparities as defined by NIH (https://www.nimhd.nih.gov/about/strategic-plan/nih-strategic-plan-definitions-and-parameters.html), including racial and ethnic minority groups, people with lower socioeconomic status, and sexual and gender minority groups. NIMH encourages projects that (1) develop, deliver, and examine the impact of low-burden and/or innovative screening methods, strategies, and tools to facilitate the detection of subthreshold and diagnostic eating disorders among children, adolescents, and adults, (2) promote health equity amongst populations with health disparities, (3) utilize existing staff and/or lay/alternate providers such as peers, community health workers, and paraprofessionals to aid in screening efforts, (4) quantify the resources necessary to implement these approaches, including training and supervision, administrative/delivery time and burden, and (5) identify and address factors that hinder/facilitate implementation and scale-up.

To be considered under this NOSI, applications must fall within one or more of the following broad areas:

• Feasible, acceptable, and sustainable strategies for identifying children, adolescents, and adults who might benefit from screening for subthreshold and/or diagnosable eating disorders.
• Developing and/or adapting screening tools in general and specifically for underserved populations/to increase health equity.
• Services interventions to promote detection of symptoms or diagnostic eating disorders across primary/specialty medical settings, schools/universities, and other naturalistic settings,
• Implementation research to identify and address barriers to delivery, adoption, and scale-up.
• Strategies to leverage existing resources.

Specific Areas of Research Interest 

Examples of specific research areas of interest include, but are not limited to the following: 

• Developing and/or refining screening strategies and tools that can be readily deployed in a range of real-world settings,
• Validating the psychometric properties and utility of scalable screening instruments,
• Feasible, low-burden approaches that leverage existing resources (e.g., personnel, alternate/lay providers) and/or routinely collected data (e.g., health record information regarding weight and other relevant data, information from routinely-collected screenings) to identify individuals who might benefit from further evaluation.
• Screening procedures, strategies, and tools that are acceptable and appropriate for underserved persons from diverse cultural, racial, and ethnic backgrounds.
• Refining and testing strategies for implementing approaches with fidelity by personnel (e.g., incorporating technology and other design features that enhance adoption and scalability and prevent threats to fidelity).
• Studies that identify and address barriers to implementation and/or scale-up of screening approaches.
• Studies that test effective, sustainable strategies for training and supervising existing personnel in the administration of research-supported screening strategies for sustained implementation and fidelity.
• Studies that quantify the resources necessary to implement these approaches, including training and supervision, administrative/delivery time and burden,

Research Areas of Low Program Priority Under This NOSI

Examples of low-priority research areas include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Descriptive studies,
• Studies that do not attend to the implementation factors that would support the adoption/scale-up of the proposed screening approaches in naturalistic settings.
• Studies proposing to develop and test prevention or treatment interventions.

Potential applicants are strongly encouraged to contact NIMH Program Officials as early as possible in advance of the application submission date to discuss alignment with priorities and available funding mechanisms [see section VII Agency Contacts].   

Application and Submission Information

This notice applies to due dates on or after October 15, 2024, and subsequent receipt dates through May 8, 2027. 

Submit applications for this initiative using one of the following notice of funding opportunity (NOFO) or any reissues of these announcements through the expiration date of this notice.

• PA-24-193 - NIH Pathway to Independence Award (Parent K99/R00 – Independent Clinical Trial Required). 
• PA-24-194 - NIH Pathway to Independence Award (Parent K99/R00 – Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed).
• PA-24-175 - Mentored Research Scientist Development Award (Parent K01 - Independent Clinical Trial Required).
• PA-24-181 - Mentored Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award (Parent K08 – Independent Clinical Trial Required)
• PA-24-182 - Mentored Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award (Parent K08 - Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed). 
• PA-24-176 - Mentored Research Scientist Development Award (Parent K01 – Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed). 
• PA-24-184 - Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award (Parent K23 - Independent Clinical Trial Required). 
• PA-24-185 - Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award (Parent K23 - Independent Clinical Trial Not Allowed. 
• PAR-23-095 - Innovative Mental Health Services Research Not Involving Clinical Trials (R01 Clinical Trials Not Allowed). 
• PAR-21-130 - Clinical Trials to Test the Effectiveness of Treatment, Preventive, and Services Interventions (R01Clinical Trial Required). 
• PAR-21-131 - Pilot Effectiveness Trials for Treatment, Preventive and Services Interventions (R34 -Clinical Trial Required). 
• PAR-23-105 - Innovative Pilot Mental Health Services Research Not Involving Clinical Trials (R34 Clinical Trial Not Allowed). 

All instructions in the How to Apply - Application Guide and the notice of funding opportunity used for submission must be followed, with the following additions:

• For funding consideration, applicants must include NOT-MH-24-380 (without quotation marks) in the Agency Routing Identifier field (box 4B) of the SF424 R&R form. Applications without this information in box 4B will not be considered for this initiative.

Applications nonresponsive to terms of this NOSI will not be considered for the NOSI initiative.

Inquiries

Please direct all inquiries to the contacts in Section VII of the listed notice of funding opportunity with the following additions/substitutions:

For Preventive and Treatment Interventions:

Mary Rooney, Ph.D.
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Telephone: 301-827-1325
Email: mary.rooney@nih.gov

For Services Interventions:

Mary Acri, Ph.D.
National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Telephone: 301-910-8230
Email: mary.acri@nih.gov