Building momentum

It's been a good week here in Vermont for the IBH-PC team. We had a great "kick-off" call with the staff from PCORI (Els Houtsmuller, Alex Hartzman, Iris Giggetts and Michelle Johnston-Fleece) who taught us all about how PCORI is organized and finances and reporting and contracting and milestones and such.

Juvena Hitt, Project Manager and IRB Wizard

Then, on Friday, UVM's IRB approved the research protocol.  This happened much faster than we expected, thanks in large part to the expert efforts of Juvena Hitt. Now we can proceed with coordinating the dozens of other IRBs that need to approve the identical protocol.

As I described in a previous post, the research effort is divided into seven teams. This week, I'd like to tell you about the Executive Team which is tasked with setting policy, making strategic decisions and coordinating all the other teams. The team has met weekly for the last several months. It includes:

• Abigail Crocker, Statistician
• Sylvie Frisbie, Research Associate
• Juvena Hitt, Project Manager
• Jen Lavoie, Co-investigator
• Ben Littenberg, Principal Investigator
• Rodger Kessler, Co-PI
• Connie van Eeghen, Project Director
• Jon van Luling, Research Assistant

So far, the team has:

• Organized the teams
• Established internal group norms
• Established online communication & documentation tools (including this blog!)
• Secured the prime contract with PCORI
• Drafted subcontracts and agreements with consultants, non-UVM coinvestigators at other sites
• Refined criteria and process for site participation (“on-boarding”)
• Reviewed the first draft educational modules

and thanked our lucky stars for our great collaborators all over the country!

Best wishes and happy integrating,

Ben