American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

Comparative Effectiveness Funding

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality is excited about the new opportunities under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) to provide patients, clinicians, and others evidence-based information to make informed decisions about health care. ARRA contains $1.1 billion for comparative effectiveness research. Of the total, $300 million is for AHRQ to build on its existing collaborative and transparent Effective Health Care program. This program allows for input from all perspectives into the development of the research and implementation of the findings.

Of the remaining funds, $400 million each will go to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Office of HHS Secretary. The legislation calls on the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to recommend research priorities for these funds and gather stakeholder input. A report is due June 30, 2009. In addition, the Federal Coordinating Council for Comparative Effectiveness Research will be created to offer guidance and coordination on the use of these funds.

Select for excerpt from the Recovery Act related to comparative effectiveness research.

AHRQ is gearing up to make the most of this additional funding. We are undertaking a process to determine what will be funded, as guided by the Federal Coordinating Council, the IOM and other external sources. We will work closely with NIH and the Office of the Secretary to ensure that we use these funds in the most effective manner and that we are coordinating our plans to maximize effectiveness of this important investment.

We will let you know about opportunities for the field to contribute to this enterprise as soon as possible. Go to http://effectivehealthcare.ahrq.gov/ to sign up for updates.

Also, please go to the AHRQ Web site (http://www.ahrq.gov/fund/grantix.htm), and check out AHRQ's standing program and training award announcements.

Current as of March 2009

Internet Citation:

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act: Comparative Effectiveness Funding. March 2009. http://www.ahrq.gov/fund/cefarra.htm