NIH Electronic Council Book—An Electronic Success Story
The NIH Electronic Council Book (ECB) is an innovative approach to using modern Internet capabilities to facilitate and streamline the NIH advisory council process. It originated as the brainchild of Dr. Miriam Kelty, NIA, who wanted to use Web technology to simplify the advisory council process of the NIA. Dr. Kelty first brought the idea to CIT (then the Division of Computer Research and Technology). As she tells the story, she was pleasantly surprised to learn that what was thought to be impossible was, in fact, quite possible. Originally there were only four institutes and centers (ICs) involved in the development of the system. A steering committee was formed with Carolyn McHale, Ph.D., NIAMS, as the original chairperson, and other ICs were invited to join in. Now the ECB is utilized in some form by essentially all ICs.
The ECB in its original form was an elegantly simple technological solution to the outmoded process of massive mailings of summary statements to council members. It has grown and evolved through the guidance of the Electronic Council Book Steering Committee into a robust electronic system that covers the full range of advisory council related activities. When used to its fullest extent, the ECB eliminates the need for mailing any documents to the council members and saves an enormous volume of printing, duplicating, and mailing costs. The system also eliminates the lag time in getting information to advisory council members. Using the Electronic Council Book, information is instantly available anywhere there is access to the Internet.
The ECB is Really Several Systems
The ECB system has achieved such a degree of acceptance by all ICs that there are now two forms of the system—one for use by advisory council members, and a second system now widely used by NIH staff members that has many powerful features to greatly facilitate the efficiency of the staff. A newer Council Administration Module has been added.
The Advisory Council Electronic Council Book is very narrow in scope. Institute advisory council members and institute staff may access summary statements for all primary and secondary assigned applications for the current round and only for their specific IC. The NIH Staff Electronic Council Book is much broader in scope. Summary statements from the current and past council rounds starting with January 1997 are available for all ICs. Additionally, there is a feature that allows for selection of data elements from IMPAC II and downloading of these fields into a spreadsheet.
Recently, the Council Administration Module has been developed so that IC senior extramural staff can extract reports related directly to council activities. This module is the point of entry for council member assignments, identification of council conflicts of interest, and for blocking access to summary statements for which council members are in conflict. Data entered into the Council Administration Module control various features of the Electronic Council Book. This is also the module where council member accounts are created and maintained.
Both the Electronic Council Book and the Council Administration Module are fully integrated with the IMPAC II system.
Benefits to NIH from the Online ECB
NIH receives approximately 42,000 grant applications per year. Each of these applications is reviewed for scientific quality and a summary statement is prepared by the Initial Review Group. Summary statements range in length from approximately three pages to more than 100 pages. The ECB allows NIH staff members or members of IC advisory councils to read, search, sort, and print any or all of the summary statements for a council round.
The cost savings and efficiency gained from use of the system are substantial. For example, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) used to print approximately 60 copies of its council books for staff members and advisory council members for each of three council rounds per year. This compilation of summary statements and other documents would—if stacked—create a pile of paper approximately 60 feet tall. In addition, these council books were express mailed to each of the approximately 18 members of the advisory council before the meeting. With the full utilization of the online ECB system, airline tickets are now the only things mailed to the advisory council members. Considering that NIEHS is a relatively small institute, eliminating the printing and mailing requirements for other ICs represents a huge savings of NIH resources.
There are extensive plans for enhancements to the system based on input from the ECB Steering Committee.
The ECB—A Cooperative Effort
The ECB represents a truly cooperative effort that is NIH wide. The ECB system has been developed and maintained by three separate organizations: CIT, OER and NIEHS. The key players in the development of this system are:
For further information about the Electronic Council Book and the Council Administration Module please visit the Web page http://www.niehs.nih.gov/ecbinfo/ecb/home.htm.
Interface 213 (March 15, 2000)