Consider These Resources to Aid Compliance With New NIH DMS Policy

Posted Aug 25, 2022

The effective date of the new National Institutes of Health (NIH) Data Management and Sharing (DMS) Policy – January 25, 2023 – is now just a few months away. The central tenets of the DMS Policy require investigators and institutions to proactively plan for managing and appropriately sharing data, and then following through and executing the plan as written. The most common pitfalls occur when data sharing is only addressed when research is already underway.

To aid researchers in establishing robust DMS Plans, NIH released an optional DMS Plan format page that walks investigators through the Elements of a DMS Plan. A preview version of this format page is available now as a reference. A final, fillable version of this format page along with detailed instructions for preparing DMS Plans will be incorporated into the FORMS-H NIH Application Instructions, available later this fall.

Here are links to additional resources NIH has compiled to help the research community meet the expectations and requirements of the new DMS Policy:

NIH Scientific Data Sharing website;
Two-part webinar series: A Conversation with NIH: Implementing the New Data Management and Sharing Policy (Please note the full webinar conducted August 11, 2022 is available for viewing. Registration for the next webinar on September 22, 2022, is available here.).
Published NIH blog posts on the new policy: January 25, 2022; May 12, 2022; and August 5, 2022; and
Notice NOT-OD-22-189 – Implementation Details for the NIH Data Management and Sharing policy.

A valuable on-campus data management resource Iowa State investigators should consider is the university’s Open Research Data Repository. DataShare is a joint project supported by the University Library, Office of the Vice President for Research, and Information Technology. The University Library also offers this Data Management Plan guide to aid in the process of developing and implementing a DMP. Investigators needing additional help can reach out by email at datashare@iastate.edu.