The NIA IMPACT Collaboratory is pleased to announce the 2026 Awardees for the Pilot Grants Program and the Demonstration Projects Program. Awardees of these funding opportunities will be supported by the IMPACT cores and teams to conduct embedded pragmatic clinical trials (ePCTs) of non-pharmacological interventions within health care systems (HCS) to improve care for people living with Alzheimer’s Disease and AD-related dementias and their care partners. Learn more about these funding opportunities and most recent awardees below.
Pilot Grants Program
The Pilot Grants Program funds pilot ePCTs that are designed to demonstrate the feasibility and inform the design of future full-scale ePCTs (Stage IV effectiveness based on the National Institute of Health (NIH) Stage Model) to evaluate non-pharmacological interventions embedded in HCS for people living with dementia (PLWD) and their care partners. The goal of the Pilot Program is to generate evidence on the feasibility of implementing and evaluating care delivery practices in real-world health care settings and assess their readiness for testing in full-scale ePCTs.
2026 Pilot Grant Program Awardees:
- Sarah Holmes, PhD, MSW, University of Maryland School of Nursing
Pilot Pragmatic Trial of a Meaningful Activity Intervention in Assisted Living - Anne Walling, MD, PhD, University of California, Los Angeles
A Pragmatic Advance Care Planning Intervention for People Living with Dementia
Demonstration Projects Program
The Demonstration Projects Program funds full scale, Stage IV ePCTs (based on the National Institute of Health (NIH Stage Model) to evaluate the effectiveness of non-pharmacological interventions embedded in HCS for PLWD and their care partners. The goal of the Demonstration Project is to generate evidence on effective care delivery practices that can be expanded and implemented in other systems.
2026 Demonstration Project Program Awardees:
- Katy Abbott, PhD, Miami University
Effectiveness of the Individualized Positive Psychosocial Interaction (IPPI) Program to Reduce Distress in Nursing Home Residents with Dementia - John N. Mafi, MD, MPH, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Behaviorally-Designed EHR Alerts to Reduce Antipsychotic Prescribing in Dementia: A Confirmatory Pragmatic Trial