HRSA HAB selects WRMA

Summary

In 2004, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), HIV/AIDS Bureau (HAB) contracted with WRMA and our subcontractor CSR, Inc, to provide technical assistance (TA) to its Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program grantees to aid in the submission and validation of their required reporting data. WRMA won the contract due to our demonstrated expertise in providing TA to government grantees.

Since then, HRSA HAB and WRMA have partnered on sequential contracts, at first providing TA for three aggregate-level reports, to assisting HRSA HAB with transferring to client-level data reports, to presently providing technical assistance (TA) to grantees for nine data reports—two  of which contain client-level data.

Details

The Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency (CARE) Act was enacted in 1990 to improve access to quality health care and support services for HIV-infected individuals and families affected by HIV/AIDS. The Act was amended and re-authorized in 1996, 2000, 2006, and, most recently, in 2009 as the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Extension Act of 2009. The Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program awards grants to cities, states, and territories that distribute the funds among local health care providers under Parts A and B; and to local community based organizations that focus on Early Intervention Services under Part C and Children, Infants, Youth, and Families under Part D. In addition, Part F awards grants for Special Projects of National Significance, AIDS Education and Training Centers, Dental Programs, and the Minority AIDS Initiative. A major component of Part B is the AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP).

WRMA, along with its subcontractor, CSR Inc., provides a wide range of technical support to HRSA HAB and their recipients funded under Parts A, B, C, D, and F of the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Extension Act of 2009. Under this project, the WRMA team offers training and TA to grantees and their service providers in areas such as data collection, reporting, validation, and verification through telephone and email, at annual in-person training sessions, through regularly scheduled webinars, and at biannual all recipient meetings. WRMA also supports HAB in developing the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) justification packages for all its information collections and has evaluated selected HAB cooperative agreement programs.

Additionally, the WRMA team helped HAB transition from aggregate data reporting to client-level data reporting for the Ryan White Program. This work began early in Phase I of the project when WRMA collected and analyzed quarterly data for the 24 Client-level Demonstration Project grantees funded for the 2004–06 cycle. WRMA then provided technical support to HAB as it developed the Ryan White Services Report (RSR) client-level data reporting system beginning in 2007, including revising the RSR, developing an RSR instruction manual that was revised yearly, and collaborating with HAB and its other contractors to provide training and TA to recipients and providers. For the AIDS Drug Assistance Program (ADAP), WRMA also similarly helped HAB transition to, and implement, an annual client-level data reporting system (ADR) to replace the ADAP Quarterly Report (AQR).

Currently, the WRMA team provides TA to HRSA HAB and its recipients on a total of nine data reports and systems. These include the:

• RSR
• ADR
• Program Terms Report (PTR)
• RWHAP Expenditures Report
• HIV Quality Measures report (HIVQM)
• Dental Services Report (DSR)
• AIDS Education and Training Centers (AETC) grant report
• new Ending the HIV Epidemic report (EHE)
• new COVID-19 Data Report (CDR)

Additionally, the WRMA team provides TA on the Grantee Contract Management System (GCMS). In addition to direct training and TA provided via the phone, email, and in-person conferences, the team also writes and updates the manuals and other educational materials that accompany each report and conducts webinars that train grantees on each report.