Today, the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) awarded $21 million to 46 community health centers to support their participation in the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) All of Us Research Program. All of Us is a national effort to gather data from one million or more U.S. residents to accelerate research and improve health by taking individuals’ differences in lifestyle, environment, biology and other factors into account. HRSA’s investment supports community health centers’ capabilities to enroll and retain participant partners in All of Us, which seeks to advance precision medicine.
“HRSA-supported community health centers’ participation in the All of Us Research Program is a critical opportunity for individuals from all walks of life to be represented in research and support the next generation of medical innovation,” said HHS Secretary Alex Azar. “All of Us will lay the scientific foundation for a new era of personalized, highly effective health care. We look forward to working with people of all backgrounds to take this major step forward for our nation’s health.”
The HRSA funding will also advance health centers’ interoperability functionality, preparedness to use and share patient data, and capacity to participate in future research opportunities.
“Community health centers provide high-quality preventive and primary health care. They can help engage participants from underserved communities, which will be vital to All of Us in producing meaningful health outcomes,” said HRSA Administrator George Sigounas, MS, Ph.D. “We are proud to be a part of this historic effort to gather data from people across America to advance medical research and improve health.”
For more than 50 years, health centers have delivered affordable, accessible, quality and cost-effective primary health care services to patients. Today, nearly 1,400 health centers operate more than 11,000 service delivery sites nationwide serving more than 27 million people.
“Community health centers are vital to engaging people who have been underrepresented in research,” said NIH Director Francis S. Collins, M.D., Ph.D. “The success of the program will rely on a diverse population of participants, and the collaboration with HRSA will help accomplish the All of Us mission to enable individualized prevention, treatment and care for all populations.”
To learn more about HRSA’s Health Center Program, visit: http://bphc.hrsa.gov/about.
To locate a health center, visit: http://findahealthcenter.hrsa.gov.
