2022 IAC Research Award

The Intersocietal Accreditation Commission (IAC) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to Improving health care through accreditation®, representing more than 40 professional medical societies in developing standards for diagnostic imaging and interventional-based procedures. Since 2013, the IAC Research Committee has supported innovative research relevant to accreditation and quality improvement through its annual Research Award Program.  As a result, the IAC has created a body of knowledge demonstrating that its accreditation processes improve compliance with standards and medical society published guidelines. The research has led to improved accreditation processes and patient care.

This year, the IAC is seeking to fund projects proposed by members of IAC sponsoring societies, potentially in collaboration with research or other committees of those societies. Specifically, the projects must be related to accreditation and focused on improving quality, safety or patient outcomes such that project results could be adopted in professional society guidelines or the IAC Standards.

The purpose of the 2022 IAC Research Award is to:

  • Explore a quality or safety issue identified by a medical society impacting patient care and outcomes.
  • Develop benchmarks, best practices, and quality metrics.
  • Use the research data to create quality or patient safety practice guidelines.

 The IAC Research Committee will award grants to a maximum of $75,000 (including institutional overhead). Awards are for one year, although the continuation of awards is possible. Interested IAC representative societies or society members are encouraged to submit a brief letter of intent. Following IAC Research Committee review, selected investigators will be invited to submit a full proposal (see the instructions for the letter of intent and full proposal below).

I. 2022 Research Topics

Research topics must be related to quality, safety or patient outcomes in the diagnostic imaging or interventional-based procedural programs offered by IAC, which include: cardiac electrophysiology, cardiovascular catheterization, carotid stenting, CT/dental, echocardiography, MRI, nuclear medicine/PET, vascular testing and vein center/vascular interventional.

Suggested quality, safety and patient outcomes research topics include but are not limited to:

  1. Identification/development of quality metrics and benchmarks
  2. Mechanisms to improve diagnostic accuracy and patient outcomes
  3. Confirmation/support of societal guidelines and the IAC Standards
  4. Validation that standardization process leads to better patient outcomes
  5. Demonstration of the value of IAC accreditation

II. Application Procedures (two steps: letter of intent and detailed proposal)

Submission Deadlines

  • Call for Proposals: June 1, 2022
  • Letter of Intent Submission Due Date: August 8, 2022 (extended)
  • Notification of Letter of Intent Decision: September 1, 2022
  • Proposal Submission: October 1, 2022
  • Award Notification: November 1, 2022

Project Guidelines

  1. Investigators with approved proposals may have access to IAC data collected as part of the accreditation process. However, the research awardee may not contact individual IAC accredited facilities, nor will the IAC supply individual facility contact information.
  2. Use of individual society Registry data is encouraged but not required.
  3. Research projects should not duplicate other IAC-funded research. Previously funded IAC research projects may be found in the Grant Recipients section.
    Published IAC research can be found in the Published Manuscripts section.
  4. Proposals will be evaluated with regard to improving quality, safety, and patient outcomes and relevance to the IAC Research mission.

Letter of Intent

  1. A letter of intent (maximum of two pages; single-spaced, at least 12-point font with one-inch margins) must be submitted as an Adobe PDF document and received by research@intersocietal.org by midnight ET on August 8, 2022.
  2. Letter of Intent Guidelines:
    • Project title
    • Principal investigator and co-investigator(s)
    • Principal investigator’s contact information
    • Medical society affiliation and staff liaison contact information
    • Study aim(s) (must meet quality, safety, and patient outcomes objectives discussed above)
    • Hypothesis
    • Study design
    • Statistical analysis plan
    • Estimated project budget
    • A statement addressing how the project advances the IAC Research Committee’s mission Strengthening Accreditation through Research. Proposals must be directly related to the accreditation process or demonstrate the effects of accreditation on the quality of patient care.
  1. The IAC Research Committee will review submitted letters of intent, and the primary investigator will be notified regarding the decision.
    • All primary investigators will be notified via e-mail of the IAC Research Committee’s decision by September 1, 2022.
    • Research projects deemed meritorious and in support of the IAC Research Program mission will be invited to submit a more detailed proposal for funding consideration.
  1. For questions about the letter of intent process or for a list of the IAC database variables, please contact Mary Beth Farrell, EdD, IAC Director of Research, at 800-838-2110 or email research@intersocietal.org.

Proposal Guidelines

  1. The detailed research project proposal (maximum of six pages; single-spaced, at least 12-point font with one-inch margins) in Adobe PDF format must be submitted to research@intersocietal.org by midnight ET October 1, 2022. Applications that do not adhere to the guidelines below will not be considered.
  2. Proposal Content
    • Title of the proposed research project
    • Abbreviated title (max 50 characters)
    • Proposal abstract/summary (maximum 300 words)
    • Medical society affiliation and staff liaison contact information
    • Principal Investigator and Co-Investigator(s), degrees, academic titles, and affiliations
    • Primary Investigator contact information
    • Study design including:
      1. Specific aims
      2. Background including significance and statement regarding how the proposed project is consistent with the IAC Research Committee’s mission of Strengthening Accreditation through Research.
      3. Preliminary data (if any)
      4. A detailed explanation of proposed data elements required from the IAC database and IAC staff resources needed, if applicable.
      5. Methods including statistical analysis
      6. Limitations
      7. References
    • Budget and budget justification
      • The submitted budget must be detailed and specific.
      • The budget may include salary with fringe support (maximum of 20% total budget request may be used for the primary investigator’s salary). The budget may also include materials and supplies (including software and peripheral hardware, but not computer purchase), publication costs (limited to $5,000), travel (limited to $2,500), and expenses related to institutional review board submission.
      • Maximum of 10% institutional overhead
      • The following expenses will not be funded:
        • Construction/laboratory renovation costs
        • Tuition costs
        • Purchase of computer devices (software or peripheral hardware acceptable)
    • Requirements for institutional review board or human subjects research committee review with a timeline for submission, if applicable
    • Abbreviated curriculum vitae or NIH style biosketch (maximum two pages per investigator) for each investigator (ancillary materials) grants.nih.gov/grants/funding/phs398/biosketch.pdf
    • Up to three supporting materials (reprints) in Adobe PDF format (ancillary materials)
    • Brief letter of support from affiliated medical society

III.   Awardee Responsibilities

  • Award Milestones
    • Funds for 67% of the approved budget will be provided by December 31, 2022
    • Funds for 33% of the approved budget will be provided on study completion and upon submission of a manuscript related to the IAC research project to a peer-reviewed professional journal. Such manuscript submission is due by December 1, 2023.
  • Signed contract/agreement
  • Acknowledgment of IAC funding award support
    • All publications and presentations citing results from IAC-supported research must include an acknowledgment of IAC support and disclaimer. “This project was supported by an award from the Intersocietal Accreditation Commission (IAC). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the IAC or the IAC Research Committee.”
  • All meaningful budget changes must be approved in advance during the award period. A brief note describing the requested changes should be sent to research@intersocietal.org for IAC Research Committee approval.
  • If the research project is not completed within the allocated 12 months, unfunded extensions will be granted if requested by December 1, 2023, to the IAC Research Committee at research@intersocietal.org.
  • Competitive renewal for a second year is available but is not guaranteed and requires a separate application following successful documentation of first-year efforts.