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News

December 12, 2008
Retreat Refreshes Behavioral, Social Sciences

Dr. Christine Bachrach, acting director of the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research, wanted just one thing out of the first-ever day-long retreat for NIH’s widely dispersed community of behavioral and social scientists, held Nov. 12 at Natcher Bldg.


December 12, 2008
CBT4CBT
New Hope for Treatment of Addiction


Drug addiction is notoriously tough to treat, but now research is showing a fresh way to tackle the problem. It’s called computer-based training for cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT4CBT)


OBSSR’s Mabry Wins with Systems Analysis Team


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Calendar

January 28-29, 2009 Dissemination and Implementation Conference


February 9, 2009, ­ 10:00 – 11:00 AM
Stigma: Lessons & New Directions from a Decade of Research on Mental Illness


July 12-24, 2009
OBSSR/NIH Summer Training Institute on Randomized Clinical Trials Involving Behavioral Interventions


May 3-8, 2009
Institute on Systems Science and Health



May 22-25, 2009
Gene-Environment Interplay in Stress and Health at the Association for Psychological Science 21st Annual Convention, San Francisco, CA

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Home > Training and Career Development > Annual RCT Course


2003 Summer Institute on Design and Conduct of
Randomized Clinical Trials

Training Symposium Series Issues in Randomized Clinical Trials havioral Interventions

Content

With the assistance of experts from several NIH ICs, the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR) has organized a series of symposia to provide NIH staff with expertise relevant to randomized clinical trials (RCTs) with behavioral interventions. The series assumes the audience has basic or general understanding of RCT design and implementation. The emphasis is on issues of particular concern to RCTs in which the intervention (i.e., treatment) is behavioral, whether alone or in combination with biomedical treatments. (The outcomes may be behavioral or biomedical.) These issues may or may not be unique to behavioral RCTs (i.e., quantitative vs. qualitative differences in the nature of behavioral vs. biomedical RCTs).

The series of symposia is based on OBSSR's Summer Training Institutes on Randomized Clinical Trials Involving Behavioral Interventions. The two-week summer training institutes provide a concentrate and interactive learning environment. Enrollment has been limited to 30 fellows, with rs of research experience. OBSSR is offering the symposia series in order to provide similar training to NIH staff in a convenient format and venue.

The course will be offered monthly in two-hour sessions at the Natcher Conference Center, NIH, beginning in January 2003. About 30 minutes of each symposium will be available for questions and discussion. Extensive use of examples of successful (and not so successful) behavioral RCTs will be a hallmark of the series of symposia.

Recommended textbook:

Lawrence M. Friedman, Curt D. Furberg, and David L. DeMets, Fundamentals of Clincial Trials, Third Edition. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1998.

A few copies of the textbook are available at the NIH FAES Bookstore in the Clinical Center (Bldg. 10, Room B1-L-101 , 301-496-5272).

Intended Audience

The intended audience is NIH extramural and intramural employees, with required advance registration to attend physically each symposium. (See below for VideoCasting attendance.) Extramural staff is responsible for preparing announcements for research programs (e.g., Requests for Proposals/Applications) and for administering grants involving RCTs. In addition to involvement in these kinds of activities, Intramural staff is engaged in RCTs as researchers. We anticipate that the audience will be mainly composed of individuals with doctoral or medical/nursing research degrees. (Intramural Fellows are not eligible. They may wish to consider applying for the Summer Training Institute.)

All symposia will be available to NIH and public audiences via VideoCasting.

For schedule and viewing instructions, see http://videocast.nih.gov/. The NIH Office of Extramural Programs/ Office of Extramural Affairs/Office of the Director is providing the necessary financial support to make videocasting available. The VideoCasts will be closed-captioned for the hearing impaired.

Sign-language interpretation for the hearing-impaired will be provided. Individuals requiring reasonable
accommodations for disabilities in order to participate should note their needs on the registration form.

Learning Goals

The overall goals of the series of symposia are to provide sufficient information so that participants will be able to:
  • Describe the principles underlying the conduct of unbiased clinical trials.
  • Contrast biomedical vs. behavioral interventions in the context of RCT
  • Evaluate and interpret critically the literature on RCTs for behavioral interventions.
  • Contrast and evaluate alternative research designs in terms of their appropriateness.
  • Contrast and evaluate methods for monitoring, coordinating, and conducting RCTs.
  • Select appropriate outcome measures, enrollment strategies, and randomization techniques.
Registration Procedures

Advanced registration is required to attend in person each symposium. Enrollment will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. Please enroll only for the symposia for which you are certain you can attend. We will let you know whether you are enrolled or are on the waiting list. If you enroll and later learn that you cannot attend, please inform us so that we can offer your space to a colleague on the waiting list.

Registration is not required to view the VideoCasting of the symposia.

Please complete and return a registration form. The form is available in Adobe PDF. While it can be filled in our your computer, it does not automatically submit your information. You must save the form to your computer for printing and faxing or for e-mailing as an attachment. You must fax or e-mail it to:

Mr. Iain Mackenzie
Conference Manager
The Hill Group, Inc.
Fax: 301-897-9587
E-mail: imackenzie@thehillgroup.com

Curriculum, Schedule, and Location

A series of seven symposia are scheduled monthly, commencing January 10, 2003. Click here for details for topics, dates, locations, and faculty. All symposia will be held at the Natcher Conference Center on the main NIH Campus.

Videocasting of the Symposia

We are live videocasting and archiving the entire series of symposia, thanks to generous support from the Office of Extramural Research, Office of the Director. See http://videocast.nih.gov/default.asp for information on how to view them over the Internet. Videocasting is open to everyone, not just to NIH staff. You will need to know the date and time of each symposium in order to find the videocast link. You can get this information at:

http://obssr.od.nih.gov/Conf_Wkshp/NIH-RCT/Content.htm.

Faculty Roster

The faculty consists of experienced researchers and science administrators from the outside of as well as inside of the NIH. Two faculty members will provide instructions at each symposium.

Continuing Education Credit

The NIH/FAES is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to sponsor continuing medical education for physicians. The NIH/FAES designates this educational activity for a maximum of 12 credit hours in category 1 credit towards the AMA Physician's Recognition Award. Each physician should claim only those hours of credit actually spent in the educational activity.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is approved by the American Psychological Association to offer continuing education for psychologists. The NIH maintains responsibility for the program.

See the Course Binder for instructions, course evaluation form, and CE/CME application form. CE/CME is available for attendance in person and via VideoCasting.

NIH Planning Committee

Questions about the Series

Please direct any questions or comments regarding the symposia to:

Ronald P. Abeles, PhD
Special Assistant to the Director
Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research
National Institutes of Health
Gateway Bldg., Rm. 2C234, MSC 9205
7201 Wisconsin Avenue
Bethesda, MD 20892-9205

Phone: 301-496-7859
E-mail: abeles@nih.gov