The NIH's 2003 data sharing policy remains effective, requiring data sharing plans for applications over $500,000, while also clarifying reviewer considerations. Institutions must comply with the public access policy by addressing copyright, depositing published papers, and ensuring citation in proposals. Various resources and institutional strategies are available to support compliance and avoid delays in funding.

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Public Access: NIH’s Update
Research Data Access and Preservation Summit
Neil Thakur, PhD
Office of Extramural Research
March 27, 2014

2. The NIH 2003 Data Sharing Policy is still in effect
• Data sharing plans are required for funding applications seeking
$500,000 or more in direct costs in any year, or state why data
sharing is not possible.
• Reviewers do not factor the proposed data-sharing plan into the
determination of scientific merit or priority score.
• Certain Program Announcements (PA) may request data sharing
plans for applications that are less than $500,000 direct costs in any
single year. For example:
– NIH Big Data to Knowledge (BD2K) initiative is to enable
biomedical scientists to capitalize more fully on the Big Data
http://bd2k.nih.gov/#sthash.9Vgplaxm.dpuf
• More information: http://grants.nih.gov/grants/policy/data_sharing/
• Any changes will be announced in the NIH guide
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No anticipated changes to the publications Public
Access Policy. Key steps:
1) Address Copyright
– Institutions and investigators are responsible for ensuring full
compliance with the Public Access Policy (e.g., that any publishing or
copyright agreements are consistent with submitting to PMC).
2) Deposit Paper Upon Acceptance for Publication
– Method A: Publish in a journal that deposits all NIH-funded final
published articles in PMC without author involvement.
– Method B: Make arrangements to have a publisher deposit a specific
final published article in PMC.
– Method C: Deposit the final peer-reviewed manuscript in PMC yourself
via the NIHMS.
– Method D: Complete the submission process for a final peer-reviewed
manuscript that the publisher has deposited via the NIHMS.
3) Cite Article
– Include the PMC number (PMCID) for applicable papers in
applications, proposals and reports, as described at
http://publicaccess.nih.gov/citation_methods.htm.

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How Institutions Are Ensuring Compliance
Training
– Policy awareness, submitting papers, preparing citations
Author Support
– Submitting manuscripts
– Answering questions
– Sending out reminders for reports early
– Means to ensure collaborators do not prevent compliance
Support on Publishing Agreements
– Policies
Coversheets/ Addenda (NIH’s Example: http://publicaccess.nih.gov/nih_employee_procedures.htm)
– Questions/discussion with publishers
Ensuring compliance
– Checking applications, proposals and reports
– Monitoring institutional compliance
– See http://publicaccess.nih.gov/sponsored.htm for information

5. Do you have a plan that can withstand
• Miscommunication among authors, and between publishers and
authors?
• Forgetfulness?
Encourage your investigators to:
• Use My NCBI now to track public access compliance
• Associate papers with awards today
• Ensure compliance well before their annual reports are due, to
avoid a last minute scramble
• Determine their compliance plan as they write their papers
Resources at http://publicaccess.nih.gov/
5
Preparation is Key to Avoiding Delays in Funding

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Resources
About the Public Access Policy:
– http://publicaccess.nih.gov/
– For Sponsored Programs:
http://publicaccess.nih.gov/sponsored.htm
– Training materials for PIs and other communications:
http://publicaccess.nih.gov/communications.htm
– Questions: PublicAccess@NIH.GOV
The NIH Manuscript Submission System:
– http://www.nihms.nih.gov/
– Tutorials: http://www.nihms.nih.gov/web-help/
PubMed Central:
– http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/
– Information for Publishers:
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/about/pubinfo.html