Proposed NIH cuts put local clinical research facility on edge
IRONDEQUOIT, N.Y. (WROC) — On the second floor of The Laurelton, a school-turned-office building in Irondequoit, Rochester Clinical Research, or RCR, studies the effectiveness of various medical treatments.
'RCR does multi-therapeutic trials,' said RCR's Jean Kelly. 'We do a lot of vaccine work, especially since COVID, but we also do other areas such as weight loss, cardio, metabolic, cholesterol, GI studies, dermatology, psychiatry, neurology, we do some pediatrics, we kind do a lot in different areas, which is nice.'
Companies from around the country and world contract with RCR to conduct these trials.
Kelly says the announcement out of the Trump administration that the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, is cutting funding to medical research projects has her worried.
'I think right now we're just waiting to find out (what's going to happen), but we have had some communication from our sponsors that things might be delayed just because they're reevaluating what those costs mean and what they might have to adjust on their end so it's a bit of an unknown for us,' Kelly said.
The NIH funding cut was scheduled to take effect Monday and would remove money used for overhead costs like administrative work, but a judge paused the change in the 22 states that sued over the issue.
New York State is one of those states.
While Kelly, like everyone else in this field, doesn't know where all this is headed, she says even a delay in some of these trials can impact public health.
'A lot of our vaccine trials are very specific for timing so you want to try and get certain data points within a certain window like for example if we're doing a COVID or a flu trial, we want to study it now because now is when people are getting respiratory illnesses like that and that's how you can prove if that type of vaccine is effective. So, if it gets delayed even a few weeks during peak flu season, it could mess up what we're trying to study, which is obviously isn't ideal,' Kelly said.
Kelly went on to say funding for overhead, or indirect, costs is essential in conducting clinical trials as they cover not just administration, but also facility maintenance and equipment, like a specialty freezer, necessary to meet strict medical standards.
The University of Rochester Medical Center recently released a statement to News 8 regarding these funding cuts saying they're monitoring the situation and responding directly to individuals who might be impacted.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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