RFI: Metrics to Assess Value of Biomedical Digital Repositories, Notice Number: NOT-OD-16-133.

http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-16-133.html

We are particularly interested in utilization metrics, indicators of quality and impact, indicators of quality of service, examples of governance and infrastructure metrics, and use cases.

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The NIH is seeking information on qualitative and quantitative metrics such as those that describe:

• Utilization at multiple levels (repository, dataset, data item). In addition to the frequency of access and number of downloads, this might include:
  • Size and measured demand of the community served, placed in the context of the overall field.
  • The ongoing rate of data deposition and data access or download
• Indicators of data repository quality and impact. Examples include but are not limited to:
  • Publications from the data
  • Data citations
  • Altmetrics
  • Patents
  • Utilization of data sets in research studies
  • Outputs of those research studies, e.g. use in policies or guidelines
  • Enhanced data sharing and community collaboration around annotation/analysis of data sets
  • Economic measures such as investment and use value; efficiency impacts; return on investment
• Quality of service. Examples may include but are not limited to:
  • Implementation of a rigorous quality assurance process
  • Use of community-recognized standards
  • User support and training
  • Ease of data deposition and retrieval
  • Technical indicators, e.g., uptime, response time
• Infrastructure and governance.  Examples may include but are not limited to:
  • Existence of an independent advisory board
  • Legal structure, e.g., access, security, licensing
  • Long-term sustainability plan
• Qualitative metrics that may address many of the above categories, such as collection of use cases or case studies
• Consideration of case studies demonstrating the value of the repository. For example, assessing the questions of:
  • If the repository weren’t available, how would that impact your work?
  • What are the data sharing alternatives to the repository?
  • What are the implications of using these alternatives?

Submitting a ResponseAll responses must be submitted to NIH_Repository_Metrics_RFI@mail.nih.gov by September 30, 2016. Please include the Notice number NOT-OD-16-133 in the subject line. Responders are free to address any or all of the categories listed above. The submitted information will be reviewed by NIH staff.

Responses to this RFI are voluntary. Please do not include any proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information in your response. NIH will use information submitted in response to this RFI at its discretion and will not provide comments to any responder's submission. The collected information will be reviewed by NIH staff, may appear in reports, and may be shared publicly on an NIH website.

Please direct all inquiries to:

Elizabeth Hsu, PhD, MPHNational Cancer InstituteTelephone: 240-276-5733Email: NIH_Repository_Metrics_RFI@mail.nih.gov