The National Institutes of Health (NIH) proposal to create a new National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) – to be dedicated to accelerating the identification of drug treatments – has promoted media interest as well as questions on whether this will result in cannibalization of other centers at NIH. NCATS could actually offer significant advantages for neurofibromatosis: unlike e.g. cancer, because its a multi-system disorder (affecting many tissues) NF doesn’t have one focused NIH institute supporting NF research. Instead NF research funding is spread out across 9 or 10 institutes ranging from NINDS (neurological disorders) to NIAMS (muscular and skeletal diseases) which can have a diluting effect on the impact of any funds invested in NF. In short – a focused translational institute could really help advance the development of NF drug therapies. Now NIH is soliciting feedback on NCATS. We encourage you to take a look at the proposal and offer your comments on the Web site. NIH has engaged in a remarkably transparent process to share its thinking and solicit others’, and we know they are taking seriously the commentary they receive.
We hope you will take the time to be part of this important effort. You can start at http://feedback.nih.gov/.
