Coordinating Center for Cannabis and Cannabinoid Use in Adult Cancer Patients During Treatment: Assessing Benefits and Harms (U24 Clinical Trial Not Allowed) | RFA CA 22 053

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFA CA 22 053

The NIH, through the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), is funding a single coordinating center under a U24 cooperative agreement mechanism to support and connect a set of related research projects funded separately as U01 cooperative agreements under the companion announcement RFA-CA-22-052. The overall focus of this program is cannabis and cannabinoid use among adult cancer patients during active cancer treatment, specifically to better assess both potential benefits and potential harms. This U24 is explicitly "Clinical Trial Not Allowed," meaning the coordinating center itself is not intended to run an intervention trial; instead, it serves as the backbone infrastructure that helps the multiple U01 study teams work in a harmonized, efficient, and scientifically consistent way.

In practical terms, the coordinating center is expected to provide day-to-day logistical and administrative support across the U01 awards. A major priority is cross-study alignment: the center will work with the U01 investigators to share and standardize data collection instruments, study measures, and other common resources so that information gathered in different cohorts can be compared or combined more easily. A key deliverable is identifying a core set of shared questions and elements that all funded studies should include, which strengthens the ability to evaluate patterns of cannabis/cannabinoid use, patient outcomes, and related exposures consistently across different sites and populations.

Another central responsibility is developing and implementing standard operating procedures (SOPs) and ensuring best practices for data collection as well as biospecimen collection and laboratory analytical assays, where applicable. This kind of standardization matters because variation in collection methods, timing, storage, assay selection, or data definitions can make it difficult to interpret results across cohorts. By setting common procedures and quality expectations, the coordinating center helps ensure that downstream analyses are credible, reproducible, and comparable across the network of studies.

The coordinating center also serves as the communication hub for the entire research program. It is responsible for facilitating communication across cohorts, organizing and supporting meetings, and coordinating topical working groups that address scientific issues cutting across individual U01 projects. These working groups are meant to tackle shared challenges and opportunities, such as measurement of cannabis exposure, capturing product characteristics, assessing symptom outcomes, accounting for concomitant medications, evaluating safety signals, and addressing methodological issues that multiple teams encounter. The center is also expected to build and maintain a project website to support coordination and dissemination within the program.

A further expectation is supporting data sharing and public access in line with NIH policies. The coordinating center will facilitate deposition of data to NIH repositories, helping ensure that datasets are curated, documented, and transferred using consistent standards. This typically includes attention to data dictionaries, metadata, common identifiers, versioning, and timelines so that the broader scientific community can later interpret and reuse the data appropriately.

Eligibility for this opportunity is broad across U.S.-based organizations, reflecting NIH's intent to allow a wide range of institutions with strong coordination and data management capabilities to apply. Eligible applicants include various levels of government (state, county, city/township, and special district governments), federally recognized Native American tribal governments and certain tribal organizations, public and private institutions of higher education, independent school districts, public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, nonprofits with or without 501(c)(3) status (other than institutions of higher education), for-profit organizations other than small businesses, and small businesses, plus other organizations as described in the announcement. The FOA also calls out additional categories such as Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Hispanic-serving institutions, Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISIs), faith-based or community-based organizations, eligible federal agencies, regional organizations, and U.S. territories or possessions.

Foreign participation is restricted. Non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities and foreign institutions are not eligible to apply, non-domestic components of U.S. organizations are not eligible, and foreign components (as NIH defines them) are not allowed. In other words, the applicant organization and the work supported under this coordinating center are expected to be fully domestic, consistent with the stated eligibility limits.

Administratively, the opportunity is a discretionary grant using the cooperative agreement funding instrument, meaning NIH staff will have substantial scientific/programmatic involvement compared to a standard grant. The funding opportunity number is RFA-CA-22-053, the issuing agency is the National Institutes of Health, and the activity falls under Education and Health. The CFDA/assistance listing numbers associated with the announcement are 93.279 and 93.393. The original application closing date was February 17, 2023, and the listed award ceiling is $500,000.

• The National Institutes of Health in the education, health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Coordinating Center for Cannabis and Cannabinoid Use in Adult Cancer Patients During Treatment: Assessing Benefits and Harms (U24 Clinical Trial Not Allowed)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.279, 93.393.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2022-10-03.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2023-02-17. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $500,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, For-profit organizations other than small businesses, Small businesses, Others.

Apply for RFA CA 22 053

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