REQUEST FOR INFORMATION CONCERNING PERFORMANCE BASED CONTRACTING FOR EVALUATION OF NIDA CLINICAL TRIALS NETWORK

Notice Date

December 20, 2000

Contracting Office

National Institute on Drug Abuse, Contracts Management Branch, 6001 Executive Blvd., Room 3105, MSC 9543, Bethesda, MD 20892-9543

ZIP Code

20892-9543

Description

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is planning to evaluate its newly formed Clinical Trails Network (CTN) with special attention paid to its impact on changes in organizational policies and practices that promote adoption of innovative drug abuse treatments. The background and anticipated scope of work follows: In 1999, the first six university-based Clinical Trails Network nodes were funded. Each node consists of a regional research and training center (RRTC) and five or more regional free-standing community treatment providers (CTPs). The CTN is expected to undertake clinical trials on a scale that would more rapidly move efficacious innovations in drug abuse treatment to wide practice. Conceptually, instead of conducting clinical trials under highly controlled conditions serially, NIDA's CTN would conduct a large number of trials in parallel within diverse settings under variable clinical field conditions. As an added mechanism to move innovative treatments into practice, participating community-based treatment providers (CTPs/clinics) are expected to work in full partnership with the RRTCs in order to balance the technology push and requirements pull of research and development. Current plans are to see a doubling of RRTCs in the second year, and half-again as many in the third year, generating a diverse clinic pool of over 100 CTP organizations. The CTN is the single largest research commitment in NIDA's history. Although other institutes within the National Institutes of Health have established CTNs, NIDA's is unique in its design and vision. With the help of this Request for Information (RFI), NIDA intends to develop a RFP to help in the evaluation of the CTN. Specifically the contractor would be responsible for: (1) Assessing the numbers and types of drug abuse treatment interventions conducted within the CTN at the individual participant/client, CTP, and RRTC levels, (2) Assessing factors that might facilitate or inhibit adoption of new treatments by other clinics. This might include transportability and applicability of treatment manuals and tools for use in non-network CTPs, productivity indicators over time (e.g., participation rates), capital gains/losses, size of contributed endowment, and the number of volunteer hours to support clinic staff, (3) Assessing organizational climate and culture (generally accepted values, beliefs, and business practices), especially congruence between the RRTC and CTP treatment philosophies via mailed surveys to all participating program directors and clinical staff; and via focus groups addressing CTP participants/patients addressing perceptions of the CTP organizational, (4) Assessing organizational structure characteristics, including: Age -- year CTP established, Size -- number of active patients, Workload -- staff to active patient ratio, Base -- hospital/nonhospital/criminal justice, Affiliations -- percentage of support from HMO, PPO, EAP, Medicare/caid, private insurance, cash customers, criminal justice system, Alliances -- percentage of patients referred for employment, mental health, physical health, housing, education, training, childcare, legal problems, criminal justice, Environment -- urban/rural, state/county/local agency, medical school, Governance -- board of directors philosophy, span of control, public/private, profit/not for profit, (5) Assessing organizational structure characteristics, including: Client Characteristics -- Both participant morbidity and comorbidity levels to capture addiction severity and/or multiple needs, as well as patient mix: adult/child, race, ethnicity, gender, Staff Characteristics -- Expertise should be assessed by examining formal training, experience levels in breadth and depth, Director Characteristics -- Factors that could influence the success of technology transfer from research to practice, such as: perceived autonomy from board, competitive orientation, emphasis on technology and innovation, and professional discipline origins. This purpose of this Request for Information (RFI) notice is to request information from interested parties, including potential offerors, about the feasibility of incorporating performance incentives into this project and to request information on the structure and administration of any incentives, including problems to be encountered and solutions proposed. Specific information is sought in the following areas: (1) What standards can or should be used to measure outstanding, satisfactory, and unsatisfactory achievement of performance requirements? (2) What are the best sources of performance standards? Should standards be expressed in terms of technical performance (quality), timeliness (schedule), cost control for some combination of any/all of these factors? (3) What, if any, impact would the inclusion of performance incentives have on your decision to submit an offer? This RFI is for information and planning purposes only, and shall not be construed as a solicitation or as an obligation on the part of the Government. The Government does not intend to award a contract on the basis of responses nor otherwise pay for the preparation of any information submitted or the Government's use of such information. Responses will be held in a confidential manner. Any proprietary information should be so marked. All respondents are asked to indicate the type and size of your business organization. The use of information received in response to this notice may be used by NIDA for acquisition planning and solicitation preparation activities. Any subsequent solicitation will be synopsized prior to its release. Eligibility in participating in a future acquisition does not depend upon a response to this notice. Responses should be identified with NIDA-RFI-2001-01, and are due by January 17, 2001. Please submit three (3) copies of your response, not to exceed 5 pages, to the attention of Dale Weiss, Contracting Officer, NIDA, 6001 Executive Boulevard, Room 3105, MSC 9543, Bethesda MD 20892-9543.

Record

Loren Data Corp. 20001222/SPMSC051.HTM (W-355 SN5093J4)