Proactive Health Office: Office-Wide Innovative Solutions Opening for Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health

Despite huge advances in the development of novel medical therapies, Americans still live with poor health outcomes and suffer from the ill-effects of disease. Current medical research and the medical delivery system in the United States focus primarily on the reactive treatment of illnesses, despite the fact that many diseases or their ill-effects are preventable.

The Proactive Health Office (PHO) at ARPA-H is seeking solutions to improve the healthspan and health outcomes of Americans prior to the onset of disease and/or the development of diminished quality of life from illness. Specifically, PHO hypothesizes that 1) population-level improvements in access to and uptake of disease prevention and wellness-promoting behaviors and 2) development of novel early-detection methods and prophylactic interventions could drastically improve the health of American throughout their lives, and 3) that system level innovations are required for delivery of proactive health effectively. Specific PHO interest areas include:

Novel prevention, detection and prophylactic treatment methods for disease:

• Novel and scalable methods for early detection of disease and illness including the use of low/no-cost sensing modalities.

• Prophylactic approaches to prevention of diseases and harmful disease outcomes.

• Methods for continuous and widespread sensing of health state and early disease indicators that can be deployed at population-scale.

Population-level approaches to increase the adoption of prevention and wellness behaviors:

• Early indicators of disease and pre-disease states and measures associated with proactive health outcomes that are both inexpensive and effective. Low-cost, high-uptake mental health resiliency and mindfulness building methods for individuals.

• Methods to inform and educate individuals about healthy behaviors including lifestyle and preventative medical measures.

• Methods that incentivize individuals to adopt and maintain healthy behaviors.

• Novel approaches to increasing individual healthspan and independence even in the absence of disease.

System innovation for the delivery of proactive health outcomes:

• Novel, robust and predictive surrogates for long-term health outcomes with associated epidemiological models.

• Valuation models for long-term treatment effects for vaccination, screening and other public health interventions.

• New funding and delivery models for preventative intervention.

Other high-quality submissions that propose revolutionary technologies that meet the goals of PHO will be considered even if they do not address the topics listed above.

Proposals are expected to use innovative approaches to enable revolutionary advances in medicine and healthcare, and the science and technology underlying these areas. While approaches that are disease agnostic are encouraged, ARPA-H welcomes proposals that bring radically new insights to address specific diseases including, but not limited to, cancer, diabetes, neurological diseases, pediatric and maternal/fetal health, infectious diseases, and cardiovascular disease.

Specifically excluded are proposals that represent an evolutionary or incremental advance in the current state of the art or technology that has reached the clinical trial stage. An example of this type of proposal might include the request to fund clinical trials of an otherwise developed product. Additionally, proposals directed towards policy advocacy, traditional education and training, or center coordination, formation, or development, and construction of physical infrastructure are outside the scope of the ARPA-H mission. 

Education

• Private institutions of higher education
• Public and state institutions of higher education

Nonprofit

• Nonprofits non-higher education without 501(c)(3)
• Other Native American tribal organizations
• Nonprofits non-higher education with 501(c)(3)

Business

• Small businesses
• For-profit organizations other than small businesses