Hoosier health to get boost from $33M grant to Indiana institute
Indiana's Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute gets grant from National Institutes of Health for 5 years of research into improving health.
Hoosier health to get boost from $33M grant to Indiana institute Indiana's Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute gets grant from National Institutes of Health for 5 years of research into improving health. Check out this story on IndyStar.com: https://indy.st/2x4uwT6
Shari Rudavsky, shari.rudavsky@indystar.com Published 7:00 a.m. ET May 22, 2018 | Updated 6:55 p.m. ET May 22, 2018
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The National Institutes of Health has given the Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute a new grant of $33 million for the next five years that will allow it to continue to do research into ways to fight disease and improve health.
Founded 10 years ago with a kick-off $25 million NIH grant, the CTSI brings together experts from Indiana University,Purdue University, the University of Notre Dame, and others to explore a variety of health-related topics that impact the lives of Indiana residents. This is the second time the NIH has renewed its funding.
The first NIH grant centered on building infrastructure, said Dr. Anantha Shekhar, Indiana CTSI director and Indiana University associate vice president of research and university clinical affairs.
With the second grant, Indiana's CTSI started doing smaller-scale projects. The latest funding will allow the scientists to tackle some of Indiana's most pressing health problems, such as obesity, addiction, and infant mortality.
"We're thinking really now to bring it all together and create a few large impactful projects," Shekhar said. "We want to create different tools and different engagement strategies to take people to a different level of understanding of their health."
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Over the past decade, CTSI has created more than 300 new jobs as well as 21 new companies in a range of industries from cancer diagnostics to drug development to information technology.
Much of the focus in the coming years will lie in prevention in Marion County, which has some of the most pronounced health disparities in the state, Shekhar said. One project, for instance, will entail using community health workers to encourage people to stop smoking, seek better prenatal care, and improve their eating habits or diabetes control.
"What we have learned over the last 10 years is it's very easy to do projects in the short term and show success in a particular area," Shekhar said, "but to have a sustained impact, we need to be rooted in a broad community."
As part of that, the institute will also be promoting a new website that asks Indiana residents for their help in conducting research at the same time as it aims to provide them with key health information.
"All IN for Health" plans to enroll at least 100,000 Indiana residents over the next three years, matching those who sign up with potential research studies in which they can participate. Enrollees will receive an email if they are eligible for any of more than 1,000 research studies across the state and can decide at that point whether to pursue the opportunity.
Nor does one need to have a medical condition to participate. More than 280 of the trials are looking for healthy volunteers from diverse backgrounds, said Tiffany Campbell, the program's director.
"We have learned that a surprising amount of people, they are in support of participating in research, they just don't know how to get involved or where to go," she said. "Overwhelmingly, people believe it's their duty to help make the world a better place, to help make medical discoveries be discovered through research."
The website will also serve as a clearinghouse for health information around the major health issues facing Indiana residents. More than 6,000 people have already enrolled through the website, which launched last August.
The program's overall goal is to improve the state's health profile. Numerous studies put Indiana in the bottom half of the nation, if not the lowest 10 percent, when it comes to health.
"This NIH grant in excess of $33 million to the Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute is an outstanding achievement, demonstrating Indiana University's commitment to research excellence and service to our community," said IU President Michael A. McRobbie in a statement. "IU researchers, as part of this multi-campus and multi-institutional effort, are collaborating to solve some of our state's most critical health challenges. Together, we are striving to make Indiana one of the nation's healthiest states."
Call IndyStar staff reporter Shari Rudavsky at (317) 444-6354. Follow her on Facebook and on Twitter.
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