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Program Snapshot

To advance the science of health disparities and advance health equity research, the NIH Common Fund launched the Community Partnerships to Advance Science for Society (ComPASS) Program. The goals of ComPASS are to 1) Study ways to reduce health disparities by addressing underlying structural factors within communities, and 2) Develop a new research model for NIH where the projects are led by community organizations in collaboration with research partners. 

In the United States, health disparities remain a persistent challenge. ComPASS awards aim to improve health outcomes through innovative structural interventions. Structural interventions are efforts to change environments that may shape or constrain health behaviors and outcomes. They can also address social determinants of health (SDOH) — the social, physical, and economic conditions where people are born, grow, live, work, age, and play — such as economic instability, limited educational and employment opportunities, access to quality housing and healthy food, and lack of community resources. The ComPASS program provides an unprecedented opportunity for communities to lead in the design of innovative intervention projects that focus on SDOH. The program enables communities and researchers to work collaboratively as equal partners in all phases of the research process to enhance the quality of interventions and advance health disparities research. The intent of this research is to improve health outcomes and create lasting change in communities across the nation.

At the NIH, advancing health equity cuts across the missions of multiple Institutes, Centers, and Offices (ICOs). This Common Fund program will focus on health disparities research in a way no NIH ICO could achieve individually. Rather than tackling inequities one disease, organ system, or life stage at a time, ComPASS projects address structural factors that impact multiple dimensions of health.

ComPASS also seeks to cultivate community trust and partnerships, build research capacity among the community and relevant partners, and enhance community organization competitiveness for future funding. The program aims to serve as a launch pad for future community-led efforts to eliminate health disparities and advance health equity. 

The Common Fund is supporting three initiatives to achieve the goals of the ComPASS program:

  • The Community-Led, Health Equity Structural Interventions (CHESIs) develop, implement, evaluate, and share community-led, health equity structural interventions, in partnership with research organizations, to address underlying factors within communities that affect health. Each project site will also work with community organizations to form local Health Equity Research Assemblies (HERAs) that will help shape the structural intervention. 
    • Phase I - Intervention Planning, Development, and Partnership: Plan, build partnerships, develop, and pilot community-led, health equity structural intervention research strategies.       
    • Phase II - Intervention Implementation: Implement community-led, health equity structural intervention research strategies, as appropriate, as well as implement structural interventions.                               
    • Phase III - Intervention Assessment, Dissemination and Sustainability: Assess health outcomes, share study results and promising approaches, and implement sustainability activity plans for community-led health equity structural interventions.  
  • The ComPASS Coordination Center (CCC) directs program administration and data coordination. It will also amplify the community organizations' research and training efforts and establish the National HERA, consisting of federal and non-federal partners in fields such as transportation, housing, urban planning, and public health to provide vital consultation on the development, implementation, and sustainability of the CHESI projects.
  • The Health Equity Research Hubs (Hubs) provide localized technical assistance and scientific support for the CHESIs, as well as partnership support, research capacity-building, and training designed in collaboration with the ComPASS Coordination Center. 

Through these initiatives, ComPASS program goals will be achieved by: 

  • Supporting community organizations and their research partners in co-creating research to evaluate CHESIs.
  • Creating partnerships that span multiple sectors of society, both locally and nationally, that advise, guide, and sustain CHESIs. 
  • Building capacity in structural intervention research, enhancing the ability of community organizations and their research partners to implement and sustain useful findings from their research.
  • Developing methods for capturing social determinants of health information and collecting and analyzing data to evaluate outcomes from the CHESIs.
  • Sharing promising approaches resulting from the CHESIs.

If you have questions about the Common Fund ComPASS Program, please email CFComPASS@od.nih.gov(link sends email).

Announcements

Resources on Community-led Health Equity Research Now Available

The ComPASS collective website(link is external) provides resources for advancing health equity in community-led research. The website provides tools, funding, and networking opportunities to support health equity research. Information was gathered through the NIH-funded ComPASS Collective for Community Engagement.

NIH ComPASS Awards Announced

We are excited to announce the NIH Common Fund ComPASS community-led projects, coordinating center awards, and Health Equity Research Hubs! Learn more:

Sign Up for the ComPASS Listserv

To receive ComPASS program announcements and information about funding opportunities, join our listserv.

Early Program Development

Common Fund's Listening Sessions To Inform The Development of ComPASS

In planning for ComPASS, the NIH Common Fund sought input from external communities via a series of listening sessions. See the summary of external feedback from various communities that informed the program development.

 

Concept Clearance Discussion at the January 2022 Council of Councils Meeting

On January 27, 2022 the NIH Council of Councils approved the concept for a new NIH Common Fund program Community Partnerships to Advance Science for Society (ComPASS). The archived videocast of the Council of Councils meeting is publicly available and can be viewed here (ComPASS discussion begins at 3:18:00). Slides and a brief write-up are also available.

This page last reviewed on January 20, 2025