Health Resources and Services Administration Grant: Organ Donation Interventions

The overall goal of this grant program is to reduce the gap between the demand for organ transplants and the supply of organs from deceased donors by identifying successful strategies that can serve as model interventions to increase deceased organ donation registration or family consent. Accordingly, this program will support sound applied research efforts to test the effectiveness of strategies that target any of the three program objectives listed below.

The specific objectives of this grant program are to increase, and improve understanding of how to increase:

1)    individual commitment to be a deceased organ donor and documentation of that commitment

2)    consent of family (or others authorized to consent) for organ donation for a deceased relative

3)    commitment of parents/legal guardians to authorize organ donation for a minor child in the event of the child’s death

Projects may focus on community initiatives to increase the public’s commitment to donation, hospital-based efforts to increase family consent for donation, and/or  projects to increase knowledge among parents/guardians, and minors if age appropriate, about the need for transplantation and organ donation among minors, and willingness of parents/legal guardians to authorize organ donation for a minor child in the event of the child’s death.

The program will provide support for the evaluation of, or the implementation and evaluation of, highly promising strategies and approaches that can serve as model interventions for increasing commitment to deceased organ donation.  While the program focuses on solid organ donation, it is hoped that successful strategies will have a positive effect on eye and tissue donation as well. For purposes of this program, model interventions are defined as those that are: (1) effective in producing a verifiable and demonstrable impact on any of the three program objectives identified above; (2) replicable; (3) transferable; and (4) feasible in practice. All projects must have rigorous methodology and quantitative evaluation components capable of ascertaining the effectiveness of the intervention(s). While quantitative research would most strongly demonstrate effectiveness, qualitative components may add useful information.  The budget and timeline should reflect a strong research component.   

Applications may focus on pilot projects or replications of interventions already shown to be effective in a pilot study or other previous research. A pilot project tests an intervention that has not before been tested for its utility and effectiveness in the donation field. An extension project builds on results of a pilot project by adjusting or adding some new dimension to the original intervention in attempts to strengthen the intervention. A replication project tests a strategy as it was implemented in a previous project but in a different setting(s) (such as testing in education institutions an intervention that was demonstrated to be effective in faith communities) or a different population(s) (such as a different cultural or age group or area of the country where the population demographics differ substantially from the original study). Applications proposing replications or extensions must provide a strong rationale and justification for the proposed project.

Projects also may test the effectiveness of a purposefully and logically coordinated and synchronized set of multiple strategies for increasing donation in specified populations. Projects that propose the use of multiple strategies are required to measure the independent effects of each strategy as well as the interactive effect of the various strategies.

Applications that propose new ideas and novel approaches to increase organ donation that are cost-effective in achieving DoT program objectives and demonstrate utility for the donation and transplantation community are encouraged. Applicants also are encouraged to consider implementing strategies that have been successful in other public health fields and evaluating their effectiveness for use in the donation field.

Because of the disproportionately high need for kidney transplants in minority populations and the greater likelihood of finding a donor of similar blood type within the same ethnic or racial group, applications focusing on minority populations are encouraged. All replication studies must include at least one site with a large minority population. If the target population of the original study was a minority population, the replication study must include a different minority group for at least one site.

Applicants have considerable flexibility in proposing interventions, including: the focus and nature of the intervention, intervention sites(s), geographic location(s), target group(s), etc. Sound conceptual models of behavioral change must inform the intervention and various components of the methodology.

All project outreach materials, such as media messages, and data collection instruments (e.g. surveys, questionnaires) must be submitted to HRSA in advance to determine if they are in compliance with requirements of this grant program.  Projects may not broadcast  messages, release outreach materials, or administer measurement instruments until a response is received from HRSA regardless of media channel (print, radio, television, or Internet).  To the extent possible, applicants are encouraged to use in their grant-funded projects existing print and electronic materials.

This grant program is focused solely on interventions to increase organ donation from deceased donors. Funds may not be used for other types of projects. Examples of activities that will not be supported under this program are: efforts to educate about and/or increase living donation; biomedical and clinical research; the development and/or assessment of the efficacy of new or improved methods of donor management, organ recovery, or organ preservation; fundamental research focused on new or improved evaluation tools and methodologies; interventions inconsistent with existing Federal law or statute; and interventions to increase tissue donation alone. Proposals to evaluate clinical outcomes of donation after cardiac death organs will not be supported.