Millennium Promise Awards: Non-communicable Chronic Diseases Research Training Program

National Institutes of Health (NIH), USA, awarded a D43 grant titled 'Millennium Promise Awards: Non-communicable Chronic Diseases Research Training Program' to Centre for Chronic Disease Control (CCDC) in 2009. This project will address the acute shortage of post-doctoral and junior faculty research capacity in India with focus on non-communicable diseases (NCDs). The proposed interdisciplinary training program will focus on the epidemiology and prevention of NCD across the life-course, in cross-connecting subject areas (child health; nutrition and lifestyle, environmental health, obesity and diabetes, stroke and other vascular diseases) and population science disciplines (epidemiology and biostatistics; clinical trials; translation research, social sciences, and economics).

The program will have two components: (1) Short-term training for junior faculty researchers for four months at Emory University, Atlanta, to acquire specific and focused mentoring and research skills. (2) Long-term training for post-doctoral fellows for 24 months (four months at Emory University in the first year, six weeks at Emory University in the second year, and the remaining 18.5 months in India). Collaboration with Emory University will compliment India-based mentoring and training, and permit transfer of skills and expertise in specific areas.

The program emphasizes on retaining talented young scientists in India, enabling them to develop world-class research skills in an India-based training program, facilitating international collaborations, and providing end-of-training grants to promote in-country research projects. The program will have a cascade effect, as the trainees will serve as a resource upon completion of the program, disseminating knowledge and skills to other researchers at in-country institutions.

STICH trial

The STICH trial was a multicentric trial conducted at 170 sites in North America, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, South America, and several countries of Asia, and Israel. A total of 2,245 patients were recruited from all over the world. A total of 300 patients were recruited from ten different sites in India. CCDC in collaboration with Duke Clinical Research Institute was responsible for establishing a network of investigators in India.  It also coordinated the project at the national level.  (Funding Agency: NIH)

DEMAT

Detection and Management of Coronary Heart Disease patients (DEMAT) in India. This is a nationwide disease registry for acute coronary syndromes in India. The DEMAT program was designed in year 2006 with an objective to understand the prevailing practice patterns in the management of Coronary Heart Disease patients. It also envisions to help physicians identify in-hospital trends of interventional procedures (PCI, stent, CABG, etc.), and assess therapy as aggressive versus conventional management. DEMAT would help in relating the practice patterns and compliance to treatment, obtain an estimate of six months mortality, identify lacunae and develop evidence based guidelines for management. CCDC is responsible for coordination of research activities, monitoring of data collection process, source data verification, data management and data analysis of the study. (Funded by MSD pharmaceuticals)