United States: Rapidly Assessing the Public Health Impact of Emerging Opioid Threats Program

Deadline: 2-Jan-23

The National Institutes of Health is seeking applications for its Rapidly Assessing the Public Health Impact of Emerging Opioid Threats Program to promote rapid development of analytical methods and tools to assess the prevalence of emerging illicit drugs and thereby understand their health impacts.

Objectives

Development and distribution of validated GC-MS and LC-MS/MS, LC-QTOF protocols and data, designed to identify and quantify new opioid / stimulant threats and their principle metabolites in biomatrices such as urine and blood. These methods, if designed for compatibility with current workflows, would reduce implementation costs and improve standardization across sites. Such standardization is desperately needed by hospital toxicology labs and medical examiners across the country and will improve vision wherever implemented. A distribution plan intended to reach organizations without expensive journal access, would also be a valuable consideration.
Evaluating the pharmacokinetics and metabolic profiles of emerging drug threats, using accepted using validated methods. This information would serve a range of roles, from understanding metabolite toxicity and drug interactions, defining expectations of parent/ metabolite accumulation, to understand the time of drug consumption relative to sampling (or mortality). Appropriate techniques to speed information gathering may include comparative studies of drug clearance and metabolite formation in human and rodent hepatocyte models, drug / metabolite screening against a battery of targets, and rodent pharmacokinetic studies. A distribution plan intended to reach organizations without expensive journal access, would also be a valuable consideration.
Preparation and supply of validated standards of new drugs and their key (diagnostic) metabolites. The development plan should include a manufacture and distribution strategy at least as part of a longer term project timeline for a sucessful project.
Development of point of care urine toxicological drug detection test strips for emerging drugs. Ideally, the capacity of the strips to detect different related drugs should be described. These strips are a vital simple drug detection mechanism used at point of care. This can be in the emergency department to provide understanding to toxidromes, and are essential component of relapse prevention monitoring. A briefly outlined future development strategy would be a valuable addition
Development of drug test strips suitable for a member of the public to successfully identify unrealized threats in purchased drugs. The fentanyl experience showed that such strips are only effective when they maintain selectivity and specificity in the presence of high levels of potentially interfering compounds and do not cross react with predictably present compounds such as methamphetamine or diphenhydramine. Data also shows that any sample preparation required that effectively destroys the sample (such as extensive dilution) deters test use. A briefly outlined future development plan would be a valuable addition.

Funding Information

NIDA intends to commit $2.5Million in FY 2023 to fund 3-5 awards.
The maximum project period is 5 years.

Eligibility Criteria

Higher Education Institutions
- Public/State Controlled Institutions of Higher Education
- Private Institutions of Higher Education
The following types of Higher Education Institutions are always encouraged to apply for NIH support as Public or Private Institutions of Higher Education:
- Hispanic-serving Institutions
- Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)
- Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs)
- Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions
- Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISIs)
Nonprofits Other Than Institutions of Higher Education
- Nonprofits with 501(c)(3) IRS Status (Other than Institutions of Higher Education)
- Nonprofits without 501(c)(3) IRS Status (Other than Institutions of Higher Education)
For-Profit Organizations
- Small Businesses
- For-Profit Organizations (Other than Small Businesses)
Local Governments
- State Governments
- County Governments
- City or Township Governments
- Special District Governments
- Indian/Native American Tribal Governments (Federally Recognized)
- Indian/Native American Tribal Governments (Other than Federally Recognized)
Federal Government
- Eligible Agencies of the Federal Government
- U.S. Territory or Possession
Other
- Independent School Districts
- Public Housing Authorities/Indian Housing Authorities
- Native American Tribal Organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments)
- Faith-based or Community-based Organizations
- Regional Organizations
- Non-domestic (non-U.S.) Entities (Foreign Institutions)