RD114 - Commonwealth Health Research Board 2009 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 121 grant awards totaling almost $9 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 almost $12.9 million for health research in Virginia.

Grants have been awarded to institutions of higher education and other organizations across the Commonwealth to include: College of William and Mary, Eastern Virginia Medical School, George Mason University, James Madison University, Longwood University, Lynchburg College, Norfolk State University, Riverside Health System, Shenandoah University, Sweet Briar College, University of Richmond, University of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Military Institute, and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.

Grants have been awarded for research on a wide variety of important health conditions effecting thousands of Virginias, including: diseases of the eye, antibiotic resistance, cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity, protection against bacterial biothreat agents, sports injuries, and AIDS, to mention a few.

The CHRB encourages collaborative research efforts and gives priority to those research efforts where Board support can be leveraged to foster contributions from other entities. CHRB grant recipients, for grant awards made in 1999 through 2004, have leveraged almost $14.2 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.