DATA ACCESS COMMITTEE

The Data Access Committee (DAC) considers all requests for use of the data with
regard to issues such as: consistency with subjects’ informed consent, commitment
to maintaining participant confidentiality, agreement to acknowledge the contributions
of investigators submitting the samples and to abide by GAIN publication and other
policies, consistency with public health needs, and, commitment to responsible use of
human subjects data and capacity for secure management of data.

The DAC is appointed by the NIH Office of Intramural Research and composed of NIH senior staff members with appropriate scientific, bioethics, and human subjects research expertise. The DAC includes two NIH staff members who are not affiliated with NIH’s GAIN activities. Face-to-face DAC meetings will be held as needed and at regular intervals to discuss committee business and review standing requests to access data from the GAIN Database. The DAC reports its decisions quarterly to the GAIN Steering Committee and regularly to the Data Use Review Board (DURB).