All of Us Expands Enrollment and Engagement Efforts with New Awardees

October 22, 2020

The National Institutes of Health’s All of Us Research Program has recently welcomed more organizations into its national consortium. These new partners will build on the program’s enrollment successes, and they will support outreach to prospective participants in additional communities.

Engagement and Retention Innovator Awards

The Research Triangle Institute (RTI), of Research Triangle, North Carolina, received the program’s latest Engagement and Retention Innovators award, with an initial $5.7 million in funding. RTI will work collaboratively with other All of Us consortium partners and participants to develop novel engagement strategies that help the general public learn more about All of Us and research.

Health Care Provider Organizations

In addition, four universities will invite patients from their partner health systems to join All of Us, complete health-related surveys, and share their electronic health records (EHRs) with the program:

  • The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, with The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler
  • Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia
  • Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri

Funding for these four institutions is provided by NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), through supplements to their existing Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) Program grants. These institutions will help All of Us fill key geographic gaps in coverage and are well-equipped to transfer EHRs using the program’s standard transfer protocols and common data model. 

By blending genomic information, health information from EHRs, and additional participant-reported information gathered through surveys and wearable devices, the program will offer researchers a database with the size, scope, and diversity needed to close information gaps and better understand how various factors affect people’s health.

“The All of Us Research Program is designed to engage participants from all across the country,” said Josh Denny, M.D., the program’s chief executive officer. “Through this ambitious program, 350,000 people have already raised their hands to help equip researchers with the data they need to answer scientific questions that affect their communities. We’re proud to work with these new partners to help more communities get involved and test a new model of enrollment.”

Learn more about All of Us partners and funding opportunities.