Objective: To drive innovation in diabetes care and improvement in operational efficiencies through use of the latest digital tools/technology including AI/ML/LLMs and to promote collaboration between RSSDI members and other stakeholders in digital diabetology ecosystem.

Eligibility: All RSSDI members in India are eligible to apply along with a digital health partner (e.g., in Healthcare IT, Wellness, Nutrition, MedTech, Health Insurance, Academia, etc).

RSSDI will prioritize projects that

• develop digital health tools or innovatively use digital health tools
• lead to digital health tools and solutions as deliverables
• address a significant issue affecting large population in India
• actively involve other stakeholders for relevance and effectiveness
• are possible to be scaled

Following are examples of eligible themes:

• Development and innovative use of tools for diabetes prevention and management, behaviour change and compliance using digital tools
• Development and use of digital solutions that ease patient data entry for clinicians including AI/ML/LLMs
• Digital innovations which increase diabetes care access to rural, remote and economically disadvantaged sections
• Technology integration (e.g., CMS, EMR, HIMS, mobile health apps, etc), and medical devices (CGMs, SMBGs, Insulin pumps etc) and wearables for improved diabetes care and management
• Creation of diabetes data sharing platforms and diabetes registries for research and improved care

Following are examples of expected deliverable from the grant:

• Digital applications, clinical decision support tools e.g., EMR, CMS
• Data Analytics Tools to analyze patient data for personalized diabetes management
• Tele-medicine, Remote Patient Monitoring Tools to monitor patients' health metrics from home
• AI/ML/LLM Tools e.g., to predict and manage blood glucose levels
• Medical devices - Software Integration / interoperability e.g., CGM – CMS, PHR – CMS, CMS – CMS
• Behavioral Health Digital Interventions Programs to manage stress, mental health, and lifestyle changes for persons with diabetes
• Research Databases for researchers to study diabetes trends, treatment effectiveness, and patient outcomes
• Patient-Provider Communication Tools to facilitate communication between patients and healthcare providers

Ineligibility: Proposals which do not use digital tools, and digitized data will not be considered. RSSDI Research Screening Committee members are not eligible to apply. Following type of proposals will NOT be considered for funding:

• Exploratory research to understand prevalence
• Trials/repurposing of drugs
• Interview or survey-based data collection
• Effectiveness checking
• Distribution of medicines or consumables
• Understanding molecular basis and biological mechanisms
• Correlation studies
• Testing of blood or other body fluid samples

Amount of funding: Four grants of Rs. 12.5 Lakhs per year (aggregating to Rs. 50.0 lacs per year).  Funding will be provided by RSSDI-KCDD budget, based on funding provided by KF and from additional donors.

Budget Components: Please note:

• Budget can be divided in: Equipment and Software, Personnel, Travel, Consumables, Institute overheads, Miscellaneous
• Budget for Consumables. Institute overheads, and Miscellaneous cannot be more than 10% each of the total budget
• Personnel on government salary or full-time paid employees of private organizations cannot be paid salary/remuneration/honorarium from the grant

Number of Grants: Up to Four grants of Rs. 12.5 Lakhs per year (aggregating to Rs. 50.0 lacs per year).

Procedure to apply: Send in your research proposal soft copy and attachments by email to Bhagwati Prasad, CEO, KCDD-RSSDI by email at [email protected]

When to apply: Last date to apply is April 30, 2025. 

Proposal content: Research proposal should include the following (main proposal should be restricted to 3 A4 size sheets with single line spacing. Attachments can be extra):

1. Project Title
2. Names of Principal Investigator and Co-investigator(s)
3. Organizations of Affiliation for Investigators, as applicable
4. RSSDI membership number of Principal Investigator
5. Problem Statement and how digital tools / technology will be used to solve the problem
6. Objective(s) of the proposal
7. Methodology, Work plan with timelines and milestones
8. Expected outcomes and potential impact on stakeholders
9. Describe plan and strategies for scaling project’s impact (after the project is completed).
10. Whether the project is being partly funded from any other source? If yes, please mention the source and the amount received.
11. Any support that is needed from RSSDI
12. Bibliography / References
13. Please include following as attachments (these will not be counted in the length of 3 pages):

• Budget (separate budget is needed for each grant recipient in case of a joint proposal) of the funding sought from RSSDI, including a breakdown of expenses and justification of each item and name of the recipient. See the section on Budget Components for some more instructions.
• Letter of support from your institution(s) if the grant will be received by institution(s)
• Resumes of team members including past projects and publications
• Evidence of approval by ethics committee, if applicable
• Bank account details where grant will be deposited including name of account holder, account type, branch address, MICR code.

Selection Process: Proposals will be reviewed by the Research Committee of RSSDI as per the following timelines.

• Grant opens: March 1, 2025
• Last date to submit proposals: April 30, 20225
• Intimation to shortlisted proposals: by May 15, 2025
• Presentation to RSSDI Research Committee: by May 31, 2025
• Announcement of grantee(s): by June 15, 2025
• Signing of agreements and release of year 1 funds: by June 30, 2025

Disbursement of Grant: Grant amount will be disbursed for the first 12 month. Further disbursement will be done annually based on the submission of quarterly progress reports and yearly presentations on the work done and utilisation of sanctioned amount. The progress reports must be sent to the Secretary General of the RSSDI at [email protected]

Intellectual Property Rights: The investigators and their institutions own the Intellectual Property Rights in the prior work as well as new deliverables that are created as per their institutional IP policies.

Publication: RSSDI expects that the grant source be acknowledged in all publications and submissions made with regards to the research done with the grant with wordings such as “This project has been funded by grant from the Koita Centre for Digital Diabetology-Research Society for the Study of Diabetes in India (KCDD-RSSDI)”.

All awardees are encouraged to submit their work to the RSDDI Journal IJDDC (https://www.ijddc.org/)