Group items tagged

PEPFAR South Sudan collaborates closely with the Republic of South Sudan (RSS) Ministry of Health (MOH) and other key partners to implement the HIV/AIDS National Strategic Plan (NSP) and has developed a five year PEPFAR strategy for the RSS. By targeting geographic areas with high HIV prevalence, PEPFAR will assist the RSS to reach the HIV programmatic goal/tipping point of 16,000 net new HIV patients on treatment and an annual reduction of new HIV infections to below 13,000 by 2017. A primary objective to reach this goal requires improved availability and quality of HIV services for families and other high-impact populations using a public health approach. Under this funding opportunity announcement (FOA), PEPFAR South Sudan prioritizes working in collaboration with the MOH to implement the following approaches: 1) expand HIV testing and counseling (HTC) through high-yield testing approaches, 2) improve access to ART services for pregnant and breastfeeding mothers, their partners, and children, 3) strengthen pediatric HIV testing, care and treatment within a family centered approach, and 4) advance the development of a sustainable infrastructure for South Sudan's workforce. This FOA solicits a combination of capacity building and mentorship for the RSS MOH at the national, state and local levels as well as through direct service delivery to complement the MOH, Global Fund and other partner efforts to scale-up HIV prevention, care and treatment programs in South Sudan.

The purpose of this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is to strengthen capabilities of the Ministry of Health (MOH) and District Health Teams (DHTs) to conduct the following activities: (1) monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of HIV program including service quality assessment, (2) district led HIV programming (DLP); (3) conducting population case-based surveillance, and lastly (4) strengthening the Ministry of Health (MOH)-owned national Health Management Information System (HMIS), to generate timely, valid, consistent and complete data. This FOA is part of the PEPFAR overall sustainability plan and transition of HIV/AIDS monitoring and evaluation into the primary national health care system towards alignment to the national HIV/AIDS M&E framework and achievement of one national M&E system. The FOA also supports the PEPFAR implementation of a sustainability plan and investments in public health systems, quality improvement, and public health workforce development. At the end of the project, the main expected outcomes include increased use of information for evidence-based decision making, effective health programming at the district levels, and a well-functioning Health Management Information System. All the data collection and reporting activities will emphasize maintaining patients' and participants' confidentiality by treating information that they disclose in a relationship of trust. All of the information provided by patients/participants will be kept confidential and secure in locked rooms/drawers with limited access. Any data analyses will be conducted after all personal identifying information have been removed from electronic datasets.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) seeks to develop and test the next generation of interventions delivered through mobile health (mHealth) technology to improve diagnosis, linkage to care, retention in care, and viral suppression among youth living with human immunodeficiency virus (YLWH). This FOA supports planning for a clinical trial and can include a small pilot clinical trial that a) incorporates emerging and cutting edge technologies to enhance outcomes along the HIV care continuum, b) supports real-time clinical decision making, and c) facilitates effective long-term management of HIV. Critical to this FOA, proposed research should identify specific patient outcomes along the HIV care continuum that are expected to improve from technological approaches.

The purpose of this initiative is to invite SBIR applications to stimulate new and innovative multipurpose prevention technologies (MPTs) through the development of new combinations of agents and delivery systems to prevent HIV infection and unintended pregnancy among adolescent girls and young women. HIV and unintended pregnancy are two major public health problems affecting young women globally. Combination prevention modalities may be more desirable and lead to better adherence in the end user, especially among younger populations. A viable and effective combination prevention modality would be ideal and critical for these young women who are at risk for HIV and who desire protection against pregnancy.

The purpose of this FOA is to support a more efficient method for jurisdictions to de-duplicate the National HIV Surveillance System. The applicant will develop a privacy data-sharing tool capable of identifying potential duplicates across jurisdictions. Activities will include acquiring a Security Assessment and Authorization, negotiating with the 59 jurisdictions to obtain their participation, providing a data sharing tool that will allow for secure, encrypted submission and matching of person-level HIV surveillance data, and providing a report back to jurisdictions on matching levels.

The Ministry of Health (MOH) in Burma and the National Department of Health (NDOH) in Papua New Guinea (PNG) plan to rapidly expand high-quality antiretroviral treatment (ART) coverage in the coming years by increasing capacity at existing delivery sites and decentralizing selected services to provincial, district and township levels. In order to accomplish this expansion, the MOH and NDOH need strong laboratory systems that ensure high-quality HIV diagnostic and clinical monitoring of patients at the existing and new service delivery sites. This will require strengthening the capacity of Burma's National Health Laboratory (NHL) and Papua New Guinea's Central Public Health Laboratory (CPHL), as well as building capacity of sub-national laboratories and improving the laboratory network in these countries.This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) will be awarded to a technical assistance (TA) partner to provide support to NHL and CPHL in several key areas, including: (1) developing and helping implement standard operating procedures, policies, guidelines, and training materials related to management and operations of national and sub-national laboratories; (2) building capacity of NHL and CPHL staff to validate, conduct, and ensure strong (and often cross-cutting) quality assurance and monitoring systems for HIV-related diagnostic and clinical monitoring activities; (3) strengthening the overall laboratory network in Burma and PNG that may include specimen transport and right-sizing of various classes of laboratories; and (4) providing supporting mentoring of NHL and NDOH staff and opportunities for professional development.

This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) addresses the strong need for an electronic repository system in Rwanda. The system will be a web-based monitoring and reporting system to be used by all USG PEPFAR-funded agencies and implementing partners operating in the country, including the Rwandan Ministry of Health, the Rwanda Biomedical Center, and other PEPFAR implementing partners. An initial assessment of the existing electronic system will provide insights on whether or not maintenance, upgrade, or the development of a new platform will address the needs of PEPFAR Rwanda. A flexible and stable platform is needed and will serve as the unique repository of PEPFAR Rwanda program data at the country level. It will be used to generate PEPFAR periodic reports, including the semi-annual and annual progress reports and additional ad hoc requests. The purpose of this FOA is to develop a new system or upgrade and maintain the existing web-based reporting system that has been in place since 2008 and build local capacity within the USG team to manage and maintain the system. The system should include automated checks for data quality. In doing so, the system will add new functionality (e.g., dashboard to easily view achievement of indicators, etc.) as well as add additional data variables to be used for HIV program planning and implementation. The Division of HIV/AIDS at the Rwanda Biomedical Center (RBC) will be one of the major users of the data stored and managed on the system, and the successful applicant will be expected to work closely with this division to refine some of the data elements collected to ensure harmonization with the national system.

The objective of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is to support the development of new and innovative multipurpose prevention technologies (MPT) with rheological/biophysical properties and product user perceptions compatible with current long-acting reversible contraceptive (LARC) strategies (look, feel, effectiveness, safety and duration of action) for the dual purpose of preventing pregnancy and HIV infection in women. MPTs proposed for development must be dual indication and prevent pregnancy and HIV infection and have drug delivery systems (DDS) capable with sustained/extended release of both drugs. MPTs proposed for development must use a licensed contraceptive. This FOA requires an industry partner, milestones linked to Go/No Go decisions and year 5 funding requires submission of a pre-IND application to the FDA.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) utilizes the Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR) award mechanism to support the development of highly engaging cognitive training interventions delivered through computers and/or gaming platforms that are targeted to the treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders, autism and/or HIV Associated Neurocognitive Disorders (HAND), with the goal of improving real-world functioning of patients. This initiative specifically supports small businesses with development and commercial experience in the entertainment software industry to partner with clinical neuroscientists experienced with cognitive training.

Human resources (HR) are an essential component of Zimbabwe's health system, and are therefore critical for an effective response to the HIV epidemic. Still recovering from the effects of the political crisis in the first decade of the 21st century, the country's health institutions are understaffed and the workforce overburdened. Efficient information systems can provide knowledge to equitably distribute scarce human resources. This includes both applications to manage information about the health sector workforce and means to electronically share information across systems. This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) will build on past and current CDC-supported activities at the Ministry of Health and Child Care (MOHCC) and the Health Professional Regulatory Bodies.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) solicits applications from single institutions, or consortia of institutions, to participate in a network of research groups developing computational models of immunity to infectious diseases other than HIV/AIDS. Applications are sought to develop, refine and validate computational models of immune responses (1) during or following infection, and/or (2) before and after vaccination against an infectious disease, through an iterative approach involving computational studies and immunological experimentation. The main goal of this FOA is to advance our understanding of the complex immune mechanisms triggered by infection and/or vaccination through the development and application of computational models of immunity, coupled with immunological experimentation to validate and improve the utility and robustness of the computational models.Another goal of this FOA is to make the computational models and data developed under this initiative readily available to the broader research community for further refinement or direct use in biological experimentation. This program will also support pilot projects, workshops, and symposia to foster the use of computational models of immunity by the broader research community.

This Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) solicits applications from single institutions, or consortia of institutions, to participate in a network of research groups developing computational models of immunity to infectious diseases other than HIV/AIDS. Applications are sought to develop, refine and validate computational models of immune responses (1) during or following infection, and/or (2) before and after vaccination against an infectious disease, through an iterative approach involving computational studies and immunological experimentation. The main goal of this FOA is to advance our understanding of the complex immune mechanisms triggered by infection and/or vaccination through the development and application of computational models of immunity, coupled with immunological experimentation to validate and improve the utility and robustness of the computational models.  Another goal of this FOA is to make the computational models and data developed under this initiative readily available to the broader research community for further refinement or direct use in biological experimentation. This program will also support pilot projects, workshops, and symposia to foster the use of computational models of immunity by the broader research community.  

This NOFO will sustain and continue progress made through the previous CDC SI Cooperative Agreement. The purpose of this NOFO is to promote evidence-based decision making for an AIDS-Free generation by monitoring data quality at the site-level and collecting, analyzing and disseminating data at all levels. NOFO objectives are to: (1) improve capacity of M&E systems to oversee data quality and data use for decision making (including capacity building of M&E staff); (2) enhance district-led and nationally supported evidence-based programming (triangulating data from multiple data sources); (3) improve the understanding of HIV burden, incidence, loss to follow-up, linkages, and referral services across interventions (95-95-95) and facilities; (4) support regular updates to DHIS2 and electronic registers (including use of unique identifiers) to reflect changes to MOH and/or PEPFAR indicators; and (5) improve and/or develop interoperability of DHIS2 with other data systems in country.

CDC Tanzania is seeking to enter into a cooperative agreement to provide software development and other health information systems (HIS) related support services to United Republic of Tanzania government ministries, agencies or departments. The partner(s) will help increase the use of electronic systems to improve delivery of services, increase the number of interoperable systems exchanging and sharing data to support evidence-based decision making, and improve the alignment between health information systems and health sector service delivery and management requirements.