Early Cancer Diagnosis Clinical Validation and Evaluation funding call

The NIHR i4i Programme, in collaboration with the Office for Life Sciences (OLS), is inviting applications to the Cancer Mission: Early Cancer Diagnosis Clinical Validation and Evaluation Call.

The call of up to £12 million intends to provide funding for the clinical validation (assessing that the approach does what it is intended to do, accurately and reproducibly in real people in a clinical setting) and evaluation (assessing whether the approach informs clinical practice in the intended way and/or has clinical impact on patient outcomes) of innovations with the potential to increase the early detection and diagnosis of cancer. Proposals that aim to directly address inequalities in stage of cancer diagnosis are particularly welcome.

This competition will accelerate future innovation in the healthcare sector, focusing on cancer. The call supports the ambitions in the  Life Sciences Vision – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) which was published in July 2021. It sets out ambitions for healthcare missions – selected as disease areas and conditions that drive significant mortality and morbidity in the UK and globally.

The Cancer Mission is being led by OLS and aims to make the UK a leading testbed for oncology innovation by accelerating the development and commercialisation of a new generation of cancer diagnostics and therapeutics, allowing patients to be diagnosed earlier and offered therapies specifically designed to target their cancer.

An online briefing for the call, including the application and assessment process will be held on Friday, 6 October 2023.

The call will be open to organisations which are UK legal entities, that have an innovative solution with the potential to increase the proportion of cancers diagnosed at stages 1 and 2. This call is open to small/medium commercial entities, NHS and Third Sector Service Providers, charitable organisations, local government bodies, as well as universities and research institutions. The contracts awarded will be for a maximum of 36 months with no upper limit, subject to justification.

For further details of the competition, eligibility criteria, and the application and assessment process, please refer to the relevant documents on the competition pages of the NIHR website

Register for the briefing event.

Key dates

Contact: ols-cancer-mission@nihr.ac.uk