Infertility Treatment, Child Growth and Development through Age Five Years

Purpose of this Announcement: This is a Small Business Sources Sought notice. This is NOT a solicitation for proposals, proposal abstracts, or quotations. The purpose of this notice is to obtain information regarding: (1) the availability and capability of qualified small business sources; (2) whether they are small businesses; 8(a) small businesses, veteran-owned small businesses; woman-owned small businesses; or small disadvantaged businesses; and (3) their size classification relative to the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code for the proposed acquisition. Your responses to the information requested will assist the Government in determining the appropriate acquisition method, including whether a set-aside is possible. An organization that is not considered a small business under the applicable NAICS code should not submit a response to this notice. This requirement is assigned a code of 541712 in the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS), and the small business size standard for such requirements is 500 employees. Background and Project Requirements: The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) seeks capability statements from Small Businesses to determine if there are Small Businesses capable of meeting the requirements to continue and extend the Upstate KIDS project. The project goals will include: (1) completing the follow-up neurodevelopmental screenings of over 6,000 enrolled children from New York State (NYS) at 18, 24, 30, and 36 months of age and extending the follow-up to include a neurodevelopmental screening at ages 48 and 60 months; (2) continuing to interface with the NYS Early Intervention Program (EIP) to refer children into care; (3) completing or arranging for the completion of the laboratory analysis of the residual newborn dried blood spots, particularly for a panel of environmental chemicals; (4) arranging for standardized diagnostic testing by or under the direction of a board-certified Developmental Pediatrician for any of the participant children who failed a screening at 4, 8, 12, 18, 24, 30, or 36 months of age, and a sample of suitable children for comparison who did not fail a screening, including transportation to and from testing sites across NYS; (5) linking participant information to appropriate NYS registries, such as the Congenital Malformations Registry, and other administrative databases; and (6) compiling, cleaning, and documenting a de-identified analytic database for submission to NICHD. It is anticipated that any resultant contract will be a cost reimbursement type contract. Potential sources are required: (1) to demonstrate complete access to New York State vital records, administrative databases, and archived newborn blood spots, including access to the confidential information needed for linkage with the Upstate KIDS cohort; (2) to demonstrate expertise in conducting large epidemiologic studies; and (3) to document the collaboration of a Developmental Pediatrician. Potential sources must also document experience in: (1) maintaining and updating large longitudinal tracking and data files; (2) designing and implementing questionnaires for the collection of relevant health and environmental information on children and their families; (3) designing and maintaining the public face of the project, including internet websites and social media sites; (4) arranging and administering neuropsychological screening and standardized diagnostic testing; (5) executing the laboratory analyses or, minimally, supervising and designing the quality control for laboratory analyses of environmental chemicals; (6) acting as a contact point for families in referring identified participants into care; and (7) compiling, structuring, cleaning, and documenting analytic databases for routine submission to NICHD through a secure mechanism. Anticipated Period of Performance: The anticipated period of performance is five years from September, 2011 to September, 2016. Capability Statement/Information: The NICHD is seeking Small Businesses capable of meeting the following criteria. Small Business organizations must submit Capability Statements in response to this notice and these will be evaluated against the following mandatory and technical criteria: (1) Mandatory Criteria - The potential source must have: (a) complete access to New York State vital records, administrative databases, and newborn blood spot archives; (b) expertise in conducting large epidemiologic studies, including study design and analysis; and (c) arranged for the collaboration of a qualified Developmental Pediatrician to supervise the diagnostic testing. (2) Technical Criteria - The potential source should have: (a) expertise in maintaining and updating longitudinal files and in linking data from such files to state registries and administrative databases; (b) experience in neurodevelopmental screening, referral, and supervising diagnostic testing; (c) experience in conducting or supervising complex laboratory analyses for environmental chemicals; and (d) expertise in website, social media, and database management. (3) Facilities and Equipment - The potential source must have adequate facilities and equipment to perform the work, specifically, (a) access to software and resources to develop and optically scan forms submitted by participants or capabilities for web access data collection; (b) access to an interactive dedicated server to maintain an extensive database; and (c) room available to store and maintain the paper form archives for the project. Disclaimer and Important Notes: This notice does not obligate the Government to award a contract or otherwise pay for the information provided in the response. The Government reserves the right to use information provided by respondents for any purpose deemed necessary and legally appropriate. Any organization responding to this notice should ensure that its response is complete and sufficiently detailed to allow the Government to determine the organization's qualifications to perform the work. Respondents are advised that the Government is under no obligation to acknowledge receipt of the information received or provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted. After a review of the responses received, a pre-solicitation synopsis and solicitation may be published in Federal Business Opportunities. However, responses to this notice will not be considered adequate responses to a solicitation. CONFIDENTIALITY: No proprietary, classified, confidential, or sensitive information should be included in your response. The Government reserves the right to use any non-proprietary technical information in any resultant solicitation(s). Interested Small Business organizations that believe they possess the capabilities necessary to undertake this project should submit electronic copies (e-mail to fe19w@nih.gov) in addition to four (4) hard copies of their capability statement addressing the areas above (hard copies to be mailed to Fred Ettehadieh at the address listed below). Please limit responses to 15 pages or less, excluding resumes. Written capability statements should be received by the Contracting Officer by 4:00 PM EST ten (10) days after publication of this notice (February, 17, 2011). Capability statements must identify the business status of the organization. No collect calls will be accepted. Inquiries should be directed to: Fred Ettehadieh, Contracting Officer, DHHS/NIH/NICHD/CMB, 6100 Executive Blvd., Suite 7A07, MSC 7510, Bethesda, MD 20892-7510, (or Rockville, MD 20852 for express/courier service), telephone 301-435-6961, FAX 301-402-3676, e-mail fe19w@nih.gov.