AN12--Research Machine Learning Analytics for Suicide Prevention Support 36C24E25R0026

Pre-Solicitation Notice for notice of intent to award a sole source contract. This is not a solicitation. The Department of Veterans Affairs intends to negotiate a sole source contract for a two (2) year period with the Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU), 3181 SW Sam Jackson Park Rd, Portland, OR 97239 to provide expertise in high level data extraction and advanced quantitative analysis of suicide prevention clinical trial data. The data integration is to improve the efficiency and accuracy of data extraction, cleaning, harmonization, visualization, and synthesis for two major VA suicide prevention databases, the Suicide Prevention Trials Database and the Veterans Crisis Line data sources. Sufficient expertise is needed in all required services to include planning and preparation, establishing procedures, data extraction (cleaning, harmonization, and analysis of suicide prevention databases), developing training materials, implementing analyses and machine learning (ML) / large language modeling (LLM) methods for data automation and visualization, and disseminate results. This demonstration project relies on machine learning expertise from the Center for AI-enabled Learning Health Science (CAILHS) to generate meta-datasets, procedures, data visualizations, and training materials FboNoticeed in learning health science. The newly established Center for AI-enabled Learning Health Science is the only center in Oregon that has the capacity to conduct this work. The inability to use the unique services that only CAILHS at OHSU can provide would be detrimental in terms of cost and ability to perform the suicide prevention research. OHSU is the primary academic affiliate of the VA Portland Healthcare System. 38 U.S.C. 8153 allows for sole source awards related to research with VA academic affiliates. Since the intent is to procure this on a sole source basis, no solicitation will be posted to Contract Opportunities on SAM.gov. The applicable NAICS code is 541720 with a $28 MIL size standard. The PSC is AN12. The authority for this action is FAR 6.302.5 Authorized or Required by Statute. Interested persons may contact the Contracting Officer via email at annmarie.stewart@va.gov regarding this procurement. The determination to conduct a competitive procurement based on responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Contracting Officer.