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Welcome
Welcome to the National Institutes of Health’s Public Trust Initiative web site! We hope that this will be a dynamic site, one to which you will return often.
In the spring of 2004, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, Director of the NIH, announced the establishment of the NIH Public Trust Initiative. As reflected in our mission statement, he stated that his goal is to “improve the public’s health through promotion of activities and attitudes that will instill confidence in what we do as a premier biomedical and behavioral research enterprise.” We were honored that he asked us to co-chair this exciting effort.
We have already discovered that there are many activities of interest throughout NIH, and expect to publish soon an inventory of those activities. In the meantime, we are working with representatives from each of the 27 Institutes and Centers to determine which activities might successfully be replicated across the NIH, and to develop a five-year plan for enhancing and maintaining the public’s trust. A key component of that planning process is the list of recommendations developed during a major meeting held in October 2004 that was convened by Dr. Zerhouni’s Council of Public Representatives.
As you can imagine, NIH has many “publics.” But no matter whether you are interested for yourself or a family member, an advocate or policymaker, or a grantee or member of the scientific community, we welcome your thoughts and input. If you have any issues of concern related to the public trust that would benefit from being addressed by the Initiative, please let us know.
We look forward to our partnership!
| Sincerely, Committee Co-Chairs Dr. Patricia A. Grady Director, National Institute of Nursing Research Dr. Yvonne T. Maddox Deputy Director, National Institute of Child Health & Human Development |