AHRQ Understanding and Improving Diagnostic Safety in Ambulatory Care: Incidence and Contributing Factors (R01) | PA 23 291

Opportunity Information: Apply for PA 23 291

The AHRQ Understanding and Improving Diagnostic Safety in Ambulatory Care: Incidence and Contributing Factors (R01) funding opportunity (PA 23-291) is a discretionary grant program from the Agency for Health Care Research and Quality (AHRQ) that supports health services research aimed at strengthening diagnostic safety in ambulatory care. The core goal is to generate practical, evidence-based knowledge about how often diagnostic errors occur in outpatient settings and why they occur, across the broad and varied landscape of ambulatory services. In other words, AHRQ is looking for studies that can measure the incidence of diagnostic error and identify the contributing factors that lead to missed, delayed, or incorrect diagnoses in real-world outpatient care, with an emphasis on understanding variation across different ambulatory environments.

This opportunity is focused specifically on the heterogeneous nature of ambulatory care, which can include primary care practices, specialty clinics, urgent care, retail clinics, community health centers, and other outpatient service models where patients often move between clinicians, sites, and systems. Projects responsive to this announcement would generally be expected to examine diagnostic processes end-to-end (for example, patient presentation, history-taking, testing, follow-up, referrals, communication of results, and care transitions) and to surface the system, clinician, patient, and technology factors that contribute to diagnostic breakdowns. AHRQ is signaling interest not just in describing problems, but in building a stronger foundation for improving diagnostic safety, meaning applications that produce actionable insights, measurable rates, and clearly characterized drivers of error that can inform interventions, policy, or quality improvement strategies.

The mechanism is an R01 research project grant under the health funding activity category, with CFDA number 93.226. The listed award ceiling is $500,000. While the expected number of awards is not specified in the provided source data, the long application window indicates an ongoing programmatic interest, with an original closing date of 2028-07-06 and a creation date of 2023-08-22. Applicants should treat the R01 format as suited for substantial research efforts that may involve multi-site data, rigorous measurement strategies, mixed methods, or advanced analytics to estimate incidence and identify contributory factors in ambulatory diagnostic safety.

Eligibility is broad and includes a wide range of domestic public and private entities. Eligible applicants include state, county, city or township, and special district governments; independent school districts; public and state-controlled institutions of higher education; private institutions of higher education; federally recognized Native American tribal governments; public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities; Native American tribal organizations other than federally recognized tribal governments; nonprofit organizations with or without 501(c)(3) status (excluding institutions of higher education within those categories); and other unspecified eligible entities. The announcement also explicitly includes several categories often highlighted in federal funding opportunities, such as Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian Serving Institutions, Asian American Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institutions (AANAPISI), Hispanic-serving Institutions, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribally Controlled Colleges and Universities (TCCUs), faith-based or community-based organizations, regional organizations, and eligible federal government agencies. At the same time, there are important restrictions: U.S. territories or possessions are not eligible to apply, and non-domestic (non-U.S.) components of U.S. organizations are not eligible to apply. The source information also notes non-domestic (non-U.S.) entities (foreign organizations) in the “other eligible applicants” language, but the explicit exclusion of non-domestic components of U.S. organizations means applicants should pay close attention to the full official funding announcement and NIH/AHRQ policy language to ensure their organizational structure and proposed work locations comply.

Overall, this grant opportunity is aimed at advancing the science of diagnostic safety where a large share of healthcare actually occurs: outpatient care. Competitive proposals will likely be those that can credibly quantify diagnostic error incidence in ambulatory settings, explain the underlying contributory factors across workflows and contexts, and produce findings that are transferable across different outpatient environments.

• The Agency for Health Care Research and Quality in the health sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "AHRQ Understanding and Improving Diagnostic Safety in Ambulatory Care: Incidence and Contributing Factors (R01)" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 93.226.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2023-08-22.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2028-07-06.
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $500,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: State governments, County governments, City or township governments, Special district governments, Independent school districts, Public and State controlled institutions of higher education, Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized), Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities, Native American tribal organizations (other than Federally recognized tribal governments), Nonprofits having a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Nonprofits that do not have a 501 (c) (3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education, Private institutions of higher education, Others.

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