Peer Review Organization

The Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences (IES) issued a pre-solicitation RFI seeking integrated scientific peer review support services, including administration of 25–35 peer review panels annually, operation and maintenance of the PRIMO system, helpdesk support, reviewer recruitment/coordination, and generation of peer review reports. The notice requests RFI responses (market research) describing relevant experience, web-based platform operations, federal compliance capabilities, and recommendations on the draft Performance Work Statement; responses are limited to eight pages and must be submitted to Anastasia.Jones@ed.gov. This RFI is market research only (not a binding solicitation or grant) and indicates the government’s intent to pursue procurement in this area.

Conduct external medical reviews (EMRs) for: texas medicaid managed care organization (MCO) or dental maintenance organization (DMO) benefit denials or reductions that are appealed by medicaid members or their authorized representatives and subsequently are requested for review by a contracted IRO; and eligibility decisions made by HHSC for a medicaid program in which eligibility is based on a medicaid applicant or recipient's medical or functional need.

The contractor will be responsible for: Managing virtual and in-person scientific peer review panels for research grant applications. Maintaining and supporting the Peer Review Information Management Online (PRIMO) system. Operating a help desk and providing technical support. Supporting grant application processing, external reviewer recruitment, onboarding, honorarium processing, and conflict of interest tracking. Coordinating panel logistics, reviewer communications, and training. Preparing peer review summary statements for each application, and scoring reports. Communicating with applicants through the Applicant Notification System module of PRIMO. Ensuring compliance with federal IT, accessibility, cybersecurity, and privacy standards. See attached file.

Provide open enrollment for independent review organization services, medicaid & chip services, medical & UR appeals.