BRDPI Cover Letter

Cover Letter

Dear BRDPI Administrator:

Thank you for your assistance with responding to the brief survey conducted by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), Department of Commerce on behalf of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The data requested will be used to update the expenditure weights needed to compute the Biomedical Research and Development Price Index (BRDPI).

As outlined in the email request to your institution, the BRDPI is an index of prices paid for the labor, supplies, equipment, and other inputs required to perform the biomedical research the NIH supports in its intramural laboratories and through its awards to extramural organizations. The index is needed for planning future NIH programs and for developing and justifying the annual NIH budget request to Congress. For example, annual changes in the BRDPI approximate how much the total NIH budget should be increased to compensate for price increases and sustain the level of research effort supported during the previous year.

The online form represents our best effort to limit the burden of this survey. It requests only information that is absolutely necessary to accomplish our goal of producing accurate and reliable estimates of the BRDPI. The BRDPI, and some supporting details and analyses, will be published.

The collection and use of this information complies with all applicable information quality guidelines, that is, those of the Office of Management and Budget, Department of Commerce, and BEA.

The information provided by the respondents will be held confidential and be used for exclusively statistical purposes. This pledge of confidentiality is made under the Confidential Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act of 2002 (CIPSEA). Section 512 (on Limitations on Use and Disclosure of Data and Information) of the Act, provides that "data or information acquired by an agency under a pledge of confidentiality and for exclusively statistical purposes shall be used by officers, employees, or agents of the agency exclusively for statistical purposes. Data or information acquired by an agency under a pledge of confidentiality for exclusively statistical purposes shall not be disclosed by an agency in identifiable form, for any use other than an exclusively statistical purpose, except with the informed consent of the respondent."

Responses will be kept confidential and will not be disclosed in identifiable form to anyone other than employees or agents of BEA without your consent. By law, each employee as well as each agent is subject to a jail term of up to 5 years, a fine of up to $250,000, or both if he or she makes public ANY identifiable information that you report about your business or institution.

Public reporting burden for this survey is estimated to average 8 hours per response. The time required may be greater the first time an institution completes this survey. This burden includes time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate to Director, Bureau of Economic Analysis (BE-1), U.S. Department of Commerce, Washington, DC 20230; and to the Office of Management and Budget, Paperwork Reduction Project 0608-0053, Washington, DC 20503.

Please provide the information requested on expenditures made by your institution and reimbursed by NIH during your 2007 fiscal year. (See the survey glossary on this website.) Please submit your responses to the survey provided below by September 19, 2008. If you have questions about this survey, please contact Dr. Steven Payson at 202-606-9788 or by email at steven.payson@bea.gov.

Your participation is very important for maintaining the accuracy and credibility of the BRDPI, and your assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for your cooperation.

Sincerely,

Norka Ruiz Bravo, Ph.D. Deputy Director for Extramural Research The National Institutes of Health