RD266 - Commonwealth Health Research Board 2008 Annual Report


Executive Summary:
The Commonwealth Health Research Board (CHRB) provides grant funding for creative and innovative research projects that have scientific merit and hold promise for maximizing human health benefits for citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia. The CHRB supports both new research efforts and the expansion or continuation of existing research efforts.

Since its inception, the CHRB has made 113 grant awards totaling over $8 million in grant funding to institutions of higher education and other not-for-profit or nonprofit organizations that conduct health, or health related research in Virginia. When the required 33% matching funds are added to the CHRB funded amount, the total project funds amount to $11.8 million for health research in Virginia.

Grants have been awarded to 16 institutions of higher education and other organizations across the Commonwealth to include: University of Virginia, Eastern Virginia Medical School, Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Military Institute, The College of William and Mary, University of Richmond, Longwood University, Norfolk State University, George Mason University, Lynchburg College, James Madison University, Sweet Briar College, Shenandoah University, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and the Riverside Health System. Grants have been awarded for research on a wide variety of important health conditions effecting thousands of Virginians, including: diseases of the eye, antibiotic resistance, cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity, protection against bacterial biothreat agents, and AIDS, to mention a few.

The CHRB encourages collaborative research efforts and gives priority to those research efforts where Boards support can be leveraged to foster contributions from other entities. CHRB grant recipients, for grant awards made in 1999 through 2003, have leveraged almost $13.8 million in additional private and federal grant funds to further their research studies.

In addition, numerous publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals and periodicals as well as presentations of the data at regional and national scientific meetings have resulted from CHRB grant funded research projects.