36C24E22Q0128.docx

Presolicitation Notice Presolicitation Notice

GENERAL INFORMATION

SET-ASIDE

2101 Constitution Ave NW

Washington DC

CONTACT INFORMATION

Veterans Health Administration Regional Procurement Office (RPO) East 323 North Shore Drive, Suite 500 Pittsburgh PA 15212-5319

POINT OF CONTACT*

Contracting Officer Ann Marie Stewart annmarie.stewart@va.gov 401-919-0878

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

DESCRIPTION

Presolicitation Notice of Intent to Sole Source

Pre-Solicitation Notice for notice of intent to award a sole source contract. This is not a solicitation. The Veteran’s Administration (VA) Office of Research and Development, Regional Procurement Office – East in Pittsburgh, PA intends to negotiate on a sole source basis with the National Academies of Sciences, located at 2101 Constitution Ave NW, Washington DC, 20418 to obtain advice on best practices to catalogue, curate, and ultimately, transfer data the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) currently holds from the 1986-2006 Air Force Health Study to a new facility.

The objective of this contract is to obtain expert advice from NASEM on a recommendation to VA for best practices to store, curate and distribute data to researchers using an ideal new data repository and for NASEM to perform the cataloging, curation, and transfer processes to move the data to the VA-selected repository.

This contract will result in preservation of, and new use of data collected from a research study of thousands of Vietnam Veterans. The data are valued by Vietnam Veterans and VA for their potential future use in research.

The Contractor shall provide the following deliverables:

Task 1: The contractor shall advise VA at AFHS Stakeholder Group meetings as specified below:

a) Provide a current ‘State of Data’ presentation to the AFHS Stakeholder Group.

b) Provide leadership, expertise, and recommendations as appropriate in Data subgroup meetings (subgroup to the AFHS Stakeholder Group meetings)

c) Assist VA with specific recommendations for data preparation and transfer by providing advice and comments on a VA-written recommendation report.

Task 2: Data Preparation and Transfer

a) Provide expertise around data preparation, management, and storage best practices to support the transfer of data to a new facility.

b) Provide all raw and paper files (aka electronic and physical files) contained in the AFHS dataset (these materials include the raw files currently held on a mass data storage device [Drobo]; digital copies of the relational databases created while NASEM was custodian; and hard copies of signed consent forms, received medical records related to the AFHS, microfilm/microfiche, paper copies of surveys, and the information from the research projects conducted under the aegis of NASEM).

c) Catalogue all physical and digital data, files, and materials before any document or data file is transferred.

d) Maintain a copy of the catalogue at NASEM.

e) Complete data preparations that could include quality assessments of electronic readability and completeness of data.

f) Complete the electronic and physical data transfer following all applicable standards and regulations for data transfer of records containing Veteran protected individual identify (PII) information and protected health information (PHI) and working with data recipients to ensure successful transfer of all of data.

g) Provide copies of information requests from investigators who had approved proposals and participated in the data management program that ended in 2015.

h) Notify researchers of ongoing work that this transfer has occurred. Advise these researchers on points of contact for the data at the new facility.

i) Notify researchers who have reached out and expressed interest in conducting research using the AFHS assets of the transfer and new points of contact for the data at the new facility.

Task 3: The contractor shall complete the following:

a) Communicate with project management team and AFHS Stakeholders Group co-chairs as applicable to complete action items.

Contractor Qualifications (this is a sole source contract) The contractor must currently hold the AFHS data, understand the contents of the data and the ideal type of new facility to house the data, and have the expertise to prepare and transfer the data and advise on its use for science and for human subjects.

NASEM is the current custodian of the AFHS data and currently responsible for review of proposed research for science and human subjects’ use. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) of the National Academies of Science, funded by the USAF, developed an options report (2007) for disposition of the assets. As a result of this IOM report, AFHS assets were placed in the Medical Follow-up Agency (MFUA) of the National Academies for curation, storage, and distribution for research. Given the role of NASEM in the AFHS and its current status as the custodian of the data, no other contractor could fill this role.

Since the intent is to procure this on a sole source basis, no solicitation will be posted to FedBizOps (FBO). The applicable NAICS code is 541990 with a $15MIL size standard. The PSC is AJ11. The authority for this action is FAR 6.302.1-1 Only One Responsible source and no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.

The requirement will take place at the National Academies of Sciences. This notice of intent is not a request for competitive proposals, however; any responsible source who believes it is capable of meeting the requirement may submit a capability statement and supporting documentation for an equal/better service based on the specifications to the contracting office no later than Friday, April 29, 2022 (10:00 AM, EST).

Interested persons may contact the Contracting Officer via email at annmarie.stewart@va.gov regarding this procurement. The determination to conduct a competitive procurement based on responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Contracting Officer.

Presolicitation Notice