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The National Institutes of Health are not general fodder for everyday conversation.
They aren’t out on the front line, like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but NIH provides crucial support in funding medical research. Each year, about $32.3 billion is funneled through NIH to a host of laboratories and research centers across the nation for biomedical research.
NIH funding has brought us innovations including home pregnancy tests and a cure for childhood leukemia in the 1970s; drug treatment for HIV and evidence that heart disease risk can be lowered by decreasing cholesterol levels in the 1980s; a host of genetics advancements in the 1990s, including discovery of a gene that can trigger Parkinson’s disease and the sequencing of the first human chromosome. More recently NIH funded a study that may lead to a blood test for Alzheimer’s disease, and another that resulted in a draft map of the human proteiome, all the proteins in a person.
You can check out highlights of NIH-funded research from 1887 on here.
The Trump administration has proposed 19 percent cuts in the NIH budget, according to The Washington Post. How the budget will play out is anyone's guess. Still, it's worth taking a look at some of the local impact of NIH funding.
In Richmond, NIH grants are used in research and training at Virginia Commonwealth University. VCU earned $80 million in NIH funding in the current fiscal year, mostly for work in the School of Medicine, according to Francis L. Macrina, vice president for research and the Edward Myers Professor of Dentistry.
Nineteen percent of that sum is $15.2 million, and the potential loss is worrisome. “This is an unprecedented cut,” says Macrina, “that immediately constrains the research that is pushing the frontiers forward.”
Some of the research underway at VCU that’s funded through NIH grants includes: a study of sleep disorders' impact on cognitive abilities and inflammation in the elderly ($158,743); development of an interactive preventive health record to increase colorectal screening ($402,661); and a program to expand minority-based participation in oncology research and in treatment at the Massey Cancer Center ($951,712).
NIH funding also includes $1.9 million in a support grant to the VCU Massey Cancer Center and $537,650 to the Central Virginia Center on Drug Abuse Research.
In addition to the pure research funding, NIH grants also help pay for training of the next generation of researchers. For example, at VCU, a university initiative for maximizing student development received $310,702. The program provides mentored research experiences to 16 undergraduate and four graduate students each year as a way to enhance the diversity in the talent pool of students seeking doctorate-level training in biomedical research.
Macrina notes that studies shows that the more diversity in terms of participation and voices in research, the greater the range of ideas, which in turn leads to more robust discoveries. Cuts in training grants could disrupt that pipeline, he says.
A decline in new grants also may further discourage students from entering scientific fields, which are already highly competitive, Macrina notes.
Hamid Akbarali, vice chair and director for graduate education and postdoctoral training, and co-director for the VCU initiative for maximizing student development, is the project leader. He also received $294,515 in funding in 2015 from the NIH for a study on the impact of opioid intolerance on bowel dysfunction.
He notes that VCU has a longstanding reputation as a center for substance abuse research, and is currently highly invested in opioid research.
Among the VCU substance abuse studies receiving funding this year from the NIH are $35,314 to study immunopharmacotherapy in heroin addiction, and $326,556 to study mechanisms of opiate drug and HIV-induced neurodegeneration.
Akbarali fears that any cut in research regarding substance abuse would be a “big blow” in dealing with the state and the nation’s ongoing opioid addiction crisis.
HEALTHY DEVELOPMENTS
A roundup of the week’s health and medicine news
- You can be a superhero for the day on Sunday at an event to raise awareness of congenital heart defects. The Superhero Heart Run begins with registration and family activities at 8:30 a.m. at Bryan Park, 4308 Hermitage Road. The event is presented by the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU and includes a 5K and a 2K run and walk. Races begin at 10:30 a.m. You can register in advance or at the event. Proceeds benefit local families served through Mended Little Hearts and Heart Heroes Inc. Capes are optional.
- Magical, mystical bicycle tour-meisters Breakaway RVA canceled their May ride because of stormy weather. The next ride is set for 6 p.m. Thursday, June 29. Expect a 5-mile, family-friendly ride departing from locations around the city, with the ultimate destination unknown until you get there.
- The American Health Care Act, the Republican alternative to Obamacare as passed by the U.S. House of Representatives, has the support of GOP faithful, but even a majority of Republicans say it needs some changes. About 15 percent of self-identified Republicans in a Kaiser Health Tracking poll said the act should pass as is, while 45 percent said it needed minor changes and 17 percent called for a major overhaul. Poll participants who identified as Democrats overwhelmingly reject the AHCA. Fifty-one percent of Democrats and 25 percent of independents call for rejection of the bill, and 34 percent of independents and 22 percent of Democrats call for major changes to the proposed legislation.
