R33AG075008

I-REACH: Infrastructure for Research in Equity, Aging, Cancer and Health - Cancer is the second most common chronic disease and cause of death in older adults.

By 2030, three-quarters of the 22 million cancer survivors will be 65 and older and the number of survivors from racial/ethnic minority groups will increase by 99% vs. 31% for whites.

These trends are creating an ethnogeriatric and fiscal imperative, with healthcare costs of disparities doubling to $50 billion by 2050 due to aging of minority groups and persistently low quality of life and survival.

We are ill-prepared to address these crises because there is limited evidence to guide clinical care or efforts to reduce disparities among older cancer survivors.

This paucity of data is exacerbated by the low numbers of underrepresented minority (URM) scientists leading studies and limited engagement of minority stakeholders to enhance trust in research, resulting in an under-representation of older minority survivors in studies.

Progress has been further hampered by the fact that while researchers from aging and oncology each study disparities, there is no infrastructure integrating these disciplines.

To fill this urgent gap, the “Infrastructure for Research in Equity, Aging, Cancer and Health” (I-REACH) will use a multi-level disparities framework to integrate geroscience and stakeholder perspectives into transdisciplinary research bridging the fields of aging, disparities and cancer.

I-REACH brings together under one umbrella the accumulated expertise of four cancer center hubs (Georgetown, University of Maryland, Karmanos/Wayne State, UCLA), stakeholders, all the major NIA center programs and national geriatrics, gerontology and cancer organizations.

The goals of I-REACH are to:

1) Expand the scientific workforce and increase the proportion of URM scientists committed to, and supported in careers at the intersection of aging, disparities and cancer, and

2) Deploy this workforce to accelerate discovery and provide evidence for interventions to improve the health of all older cancer survivors.

These goals will be accomplished with three cores and two programs in overlapping phases using a distributed resource, distance-learning approach.

In the two-year R21 phase, we develop, implement and begin to evaluate cores (Aim 1) and prepare for R33 transition: a career development core providing a mentoring program and a foundational curriculum; a data resources core enabling use of secondary data to fill knowledge gaps in our disparities framework; and a stakeholder core to integrate stakeholder perspectives and support recruitment of older minorities.

In the three-year R33 phase, the cores will be deployed to provide a two-year mentored scholars program for pre-doctoral, doctoral and early stage to senior scientists (Aim 2) and a pilot program (Aim 3) funding small grants to address evidence gaps in our multi-level framework and build sustainability and disseminate results (Aim 4).

Eighty-six scientists (65% women and 36% URM) have already agreed to participate.

I-REACH will provide value-added to the NIH by bridging NIA and NCI priorities and addressing areas not covered in other programs.

I-REACH is ideally timed to address needs of a rapidly growing diverse, older population.

Georgetown University

TO ENCOURAGE BIOMEDICAL, SOCIAL, AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH AND RESEARCH TRAINING DIRECTED TOWARD GREATER UNDERSTANDING OF THE AGING PROCESS AND THE DISEASES, SPECIAL PROBLEMS, AND NEEDS OF PEOPLE AS THEY AGE. THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE ON AGING HAS ESTABLISHED PROGRAMS TO PURSUE THESE GOALS. THE DIVISION OF AGING BIOLOGY EMPHASIZES UNDERSTANDING THE BASIC BIOLOGICAL PROCESSES OF AGING. THE DIVISION OF GERIATRICS AND CLINICAL GERONTOLOGY SUPPORTS RESEARCH TO IMPROVE THE ABILITIES OF HEALTH CARE PRACTITIONERS TO RESPOND TO THE DISEASES AND OTHER CLINICAL PROBLEMS OF OLDER PEOPLE. THE DIVISION OF BEHAVIORAL AND SOCIAL RESEARCH SUPPORTS RESEARCH THAT WILL LEAD TO GREATER UNDERSTANDING OF THE SOCIAL, CULTURAL, ECONOMIC AND PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS THAT AFFECT BOTH THE PROCESS OF GROWING OLD AND THE PLACE OF OLDER PEOPLE IN SOCIETY. THE DIVISION OF NEUROSCIENCE FOSTERS RESEARCH CONCERNED WITH THE AGE-RELATED CHANGES IN THE NERVOUS SYSTEM AS WELL AS THE RELATED SENSORY, PERCEPTUAL, AND COGNITIVE PROCESSES ASSOCIATED WITH AGING AND HAS A SPECIAL EMPHASIS ON ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE. SMALL BUSINESS INNOVATION RESEARCH (SBIR) PROGRAM: TO EXPAND AND IMPROVE THE SBIR PROGRAM, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, TO INCREASE SMALL BUSINESS PARTICIPATION IN FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION. SMALL BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER (STTR) PROGRAM: TO STIMULATE AND FOSTER SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION THROUGH COOPERATIVE RESEARCH DEVELOPMENT CARRIED OUT BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO FOSTER TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER BETWEEN SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND RESEARCH INSTITUTIONS, TO INCREASE PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIALIZATION OF INNOVATIONS DERIVED FROM FEDERAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT, AND TO FOSTER AND ENCOURAGE PARTICIPATION OF SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS AND WOMEN-OWNED SMALL BUSINESS CONCERNS IN TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION.

93.866 - Aging Research

National Institute on Aging (NIA) [HHS - NIH]

District Of Columbia United States

State-Wide

Research Infrastructure Development for Interdisciplinary Aging Studies (R21/R33 - Clinical Trial Optional) (PAR-20-070)

Amendment Since initial award the total obligations have increased 98% from $780,419 to $1,542,803.