National Institute of Standards and Technology, Bldg. 101, Room A430, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-0001

A -- REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS AND NOTICE OF PUBLIC MEETING SOL Q- DUE 043097 POC Customer Representative 1-800-287-3863 WEB: National Institute of Standards and Technology, http://www.atp.nist.gov. Department of Commerce Technology Administration National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Advanced Technology Program Administration Building 101, Rm. A407 Gaithersburg, MD 20899-0001 Date: December 23, 1996 REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS AND NOTICE OF PUBLIC MEETING: The NIST Advanced Technology Program (ATP) is soliciting proposals under its focused program competition 97-03, Information Infrastructure for Healthcare (IIH) and announces a public meeting (Proposers' Conference) for all interested parties. This notice provides general information for this focused program competition 97-03. An estimated $10 million to $15 million in first-year ATP funding is available under this focused program competition. The ATP reserves the right to utilize for this competition more or less funding than the amount stated above. The actual number of proposals funded will depend on the quality of the proposals received and the amount of funding requested in the highest ranked proposals. Outyear funding is contingent on the approval of future Congressional appropriations and satisfactory project performance. This is the third of four competitions planned for this ATP focused program. One additional competition is planned. Award recipients will be required to share non-proprietary information at workshops which will be held throughout the duration of the program. The ATP operates under program procedures published at Part 295, Title 15, of the Code of Federal Regulations. The ATP Proposal Preparation Kit dated November 1996 (containing proposal cover sheets, other required forms, background material, and instructions for submission of proposals) and the focused program paper entitled "Information Infrastructure for Healthcare, Supplemental Information Focused Program Competition 97-03," may be obtained by phone (1-800-ATP- FUND), fax (301-926-9524 or 301-590-3053), e-mail (atp@nist.gov), or written request at the address shown below. Note that those individuals whose names are currently on the ATP mailing list should have already received the new November 1996 version of the ATP Proposal Preparation Kit. The supplemental information paper for this focused program is available on our world wide web site (http://www.atp.nist.gov) and printed copies are available upon request from ATP. Only FULL proposals are being solicited under this focused program competition 97-03. Abbreviated/pre-proposals WILL NOT be accepted. Proposals submitted by facsimile or electronic mail WILL NOT be accepted. If a proposer's proposal is judged to be of high enough quality to be invited in for an oral review, ATP reserves the right to submit a list of questions to the proposer that must be addressed at the oral review. The due date for submission of full proposals is 3 p.m. Eastern time on Wednesday, April 30, 1997. Should the NIST facility be closed on the specified due date, ATP proposals will be due at 3 p.m. Eastern time on the next business day that the NIST facility is open. Proposals received after this deadline WILL NOTbe considered. Send proposals to: Advanced Technology Program, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Administration Building 101, Rm. A407, Quince Orchard & Clopper Roads, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-0001. Mark envelope Focused Program 97- 03. The goal of this Information Infrastructure for Healthcare focused program is to promote U.S. economic growth by supporting sustained, high-risk research and development which will accelerate the development of critical information infrastructure technologies to enable enhanced, more fully integrated medical information systems across the healthcare industry, greatly reducing costs and errors in handling medical information. Proposals submitted to this competition must be in the areas of infrastructure development technologies or user interface and efficiency-enhancement technologies. Specifically, infrastructure development technologies are the tools for: business process modeling; total quality management; enterprise integration; domain analysis; verification and validation. In the areas of user interface and efficiency-enhancement technologies, proposals must fall in one or more of the following areas: information access, transmission, storage, and retrieval; multimedia information; security and privacy; mobile and collaborative computing. The scope of this solicitation is discussed in more detail in the focused program paper referred to above. Research proposed under this solicitation should be tailored to the requirements of the healthcare information infrastructure but should be applicable to other domains as well. Proposals must include a discussion of how the project will enhance and/or speed up the development of the information infrastructure for healthcare, and detail should be provided on synergy with any on-going efforts, whether Federally or privately funded. Evidence should be provided of interface efforts and integration across projects, teams, technologies, and domains. Attention should be given to the end user who will access the system to obtain the information sought, with insight to use by both large institutions and small, private users. Other areas of discussion should, when applicable, cover: the proposal~s impact on any existing or developing standards efforts; issues related to security, privacy, and confidentiality; scalability; system requirements and performance; relevance of the technology being suggested to related legislative and regulatory issues. This solicitation will not accept proposals which differ in content and focus from the scope discussed above. Specifically excluded are projects whose sole or primary focus is the development of specialized medical equipment or technologies that do not pertain to the healthcare information infrastructure. A public meeting (Proposers' Conference) for potential proposers and other interested parties under this focused program competition 97-03 will be held on Thursday, February 13, 1997, at the Gaithersburg Hilton, 620 Perry Parkway, Gaithersburg, MD. The conference will begin at 9:30 a.m. local time and end at approximately 2 p.m. and will provide general information regarding the ATP and hints on preparing good proposals (covering the same material presented at previous ATP Proposers' Conferences), and will provide an opportunity for attendees to ask questions on the scope and technical and business goals of this focused program. Attendance at this public meeting is not required. No registration fee will be charged. To register for this public meeting or for further information, contact ATP, by phone: 1-800-ATP-FUND; fax: 301-926- 9524 or 301-590-3053; or e-mail: atp@nist.gov. In addition to the focused program bidders' conference in Gaithersburg, ATP is considering some additional bidders' conferences in other locations. Should any additional conferences be arranged, that information will be published in the CBD and on our WWW site. On December 5, 1996, ATP announced in the CBD the General Competition 97-01 and six bidders' conferences to be held throughout the country from January 6 -- 13, 1997. Interested parties are welcome to attend any of these for additional information on the ATP and for hints on preparing good proposals. (0358)

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