Inactive
Notice ID:36C24E23Q0145
SUMMARY: This is a Sources Sought notice and not a request for proposals. This request is solely for the purpose of conducting market research to enhance VHA s understanding of the market s offered pr...
SUMMARY: This is a Sources Sought notice and not a request for proposals. This request is solely for the purpose of conducting market research to enhance VHA s understanding of the market s offered products, services, and capabilities. The Government will not pay any costs for responses submitted in response to this Sources Sought. This Sources Sought notice provides an opportunity for respondents to submit their notice of ability, and their available products and services in response to the requirement described below. Vendors are being invited to submit information relative to their potential of fulfilling the requirement below, in the form of a capability response that addresses the specific requirement identified in this Sources Sought. The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is seeking a vendor to provide the following services below. Please see sections 1 and 2 below for the requested services and descriptions. This Sources Sought is to facilitate the Contracting Officer s review of the market base, for acquisition planning, size determination, and procurement strategy. 1. GENERAL REQUIREMENTS The Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Research & Development requires for the services to conduct a mixed methods study to determine the US Veteran population prevalence of moral injury. The primary method entails conducting an online survey study of a nationally representative probability sample of US Veterans. A secondary method entails inviting a random subset of 20 moral injury cases and 20 matched non-cases all of whom endorse significant exposure to morally injurious events from the surveyed cohort to participate in virtual semi-structured individual interviews. 2. CONTRACTOR REQUIREMENTS AND TASKS: Requirements The survey company shall have the following characteristics: Expertise in random probabilistic population-based survey methods. Successful experience conducing epidemiological surveys of Veterans mental and behavioral health for the Department of Veterans Affairs. An established nationally representative probability-based online survey panel of Veterans that also provides internet connections to non-internet households. The Veteran panel shall be representative of the U.S. Veteran population in terms of sex, age, race, ethnicity, income, and educational attainment. The Veteran panel shall contain existing information on age, whether participants were deployed to post-9-11 operations, and degree of combat exposure, to allow close monitoring of the completion rate among those two subgroups for the project. Established survey cooperation rates of 70% or higher for Veteran surveys. Can flexibly extend data collection period and send multiple reminders to participants, if necessary. Can incentivize participation with direct payments to help with the completion rate. Can format the survey for smartphones. Can conduct quality control interview-based testing of the survey to ensure proper wording and formatting. Can collect survey data on a password protected secure server. Note: Please specify if an all-online, probability-based panel will be used. Please provide any past performance with VA Healthcare Systems similar in scope. Workflow Task 1: Finalize survey formatting and process. The survey company will be sent the questionnaires that comprise the survey portion of the project. They shall provide feedback about survey questionnaire formatting to improve formatting and generate proper skip-logic to reduce instrument errors. Deliverable: Initial survey for pilot testing Task 2: Field testing of the survey. The survey company shall conduct quality control interview-based testing of the survey to ensure proper wording and formatting. Deliverable: Report detailing findings and recommendations for finalizing survey and its format Task 3: Finalize formatting of the survey. The survey company will finalize the formatting to reduce participant burden and to ensure a very low error rate (incomplete questionnaires, missing data). Deliverable: Finalized survey Task 4: Finalize the sampling frame to ensure that the Veterans panel is nationally representative. The survey company will ensure that younger Veterans and Veterans who had deployed to post-9-11 operations with sufficient combat exposure will be oversampled. Deliverable: Report detailing finalized sampling Task 5: Conduct the survey on the Veteran Panel. The survey company will deploy a ~30-45 minute survey nationally to a sufficient number of Veterans to obtain at least 3000 completed responses from respondents. Each assigned survey needs to have a unique ID to track which respondents have completed the survey and to avoid unnecessary reminders. The survey company needs to be able to send a personal notification email to each panel members computer. The email notification needs to contain a button to start the survey. Participants need to also be able to access the online survey by logging into a specific hyperlink. The survey company will ensure that at least 950 of the Veterans who participate served in a combat or war zone and at least 400 are younger Veterans aged 18 to 54. They survey company will pay participants $20 to incentivize participation and completion. Task 6: Deliver the survey data to research office. The survey company needs to be able to electronically deliver a cleaned and weighted data set that includes population weights (such that the sum of weights equals the total eligible adult population) to include a SAS dataset with appropriate coding and data labels that contain no protected health information. The company needs to be able to supplement the survey data collected with the question-specific response times and with demographic information previously collected. The supplementary demographic variables need to include the standard profile variables on age, education, race/ethnicity, gender, household head, household size, housing type, HH income, marital status, MSA status, internet access, ownership status of living quarters, region of US, state, and current employment status at a minimum. The data file needs to incorporate statistical weights that contain probabilities of selection and projections to population benchmarks. The survey company needs to use ABS sampling methodology, providing a probability-based starting sample of U.S. households. The base panel sample weights need to be referenced to the U.S. Census demographic benchmarks to reduce bias due to non-response and other non-sampling errors, including probability of selection. Appropriate sample design weights need to be calculated based on Veteran specific samples and selection weights. Nonresponse and post-stratification weighting adjustments need to be applied to the final survey data to reduce the effects of non-sampling error (variance and bias). The survey company needs to compute and provide post-stratification weights based on age, gender, race, education, Census region, and metropolitan area based on the recent January Census Current Population Survey Veteran supplement. In addition, within 10 days of survey completion, the survey company needs to provide a draft report describing the survey procedures, sampling and data collection procedures, a codebook, panel recruitment methods, technical details, statistical weighting details, and summary results. This will include key survey statistics for an online sample such as the recruitment rate, profile rate, completion rate, and cumulative response rate. The survey company will submit a final report incorporating any responses and comments from the investigators. Deliverable: Cleaned and weighted data set (electronic delivery) Task 7: Draft report of survey processes and experiences Within 10 days of survey completion, the survey company needs to provide a draft report describing the survey procedures, sampling and data collection procedures, a codebook, panel recruitment methods, technical details, statistical weighting details, and summary results. This will include key survey statistics for an online sample such as the recruitment rate, profile rate, completion rate, and cumulative response rate. The survey company will submit a final report incorporating any responses and comments from the investigators. Deliverable: Draft report Task 8: Schedule a telephone interview for a random subset of 20 moral injury cases and non-cases. The survey company will be provided with a random subset of 40 cases that they need to contact to inquire about whether they will be willing to be interviewed by a psychologist working on the research project. If need be, more cases will be provided to be contacted. The survey company will work with the psychologist to schedule these telephone interviews. The survey company will facilitate a warm handoff three-way telephone call to the psychologist to ensure anonymity. Deliverable: Interview Schedule 3. CAPABILITIES STATEMENT AND MARKET INFORMATION Please respond to the following by providing a capabilities statement and market information. 4. RESPONSE: All potential sources are invited to submit, in writing, a capability statement with sufficient information to substantiate your business is reasonably capable of performing the work. The capability statement must clearly demonstrate a business s ability to fulfill the requirement. The burden of proof rests with the contractor; therefore, written responses must provide clear and unambiguous evidence to substantiate capabilities appropriate to satisfy this need. Responses shall be in Microsoft Word compatible format and are due no later than June 13, 2023, 3 PM EST. Responses shall be limited to 20 pages. Please be advised that all submissions become Government property and will not be returned. Responses shall be sent to annmarie.stewart@va.gov. Responses shall provide administrative information, and shall include the following as a minimum: Company Name, DUNs number, Company mailing address, phone number, fax number, name of designated point of contact and e-mail of designated point of contact. Company business size and status (i.e., Large Business, Small Business, Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business, Women-Owned Small Business, etc.), the number of years in business, affiliate information: parent company, joint venture partners, and potential teaming partners. Please provide GSA schedule if applicable. All responses should be directed to annmarie.stewart@va.gov by June 13, 2023, 3 PM EST. B. Submittals furnished will not be returned to the sender. No debriefs will be conducted. Eligibility in participating in a future acquisition does not depend upon a response to this notice. C. Proprietary information is neither requested nor desired. If such information is submitted, it must clearly be marked "proprietary" on every sheet containing such information, and the proprietary information must be segregated to the maximum extent practicable from other portions of the response (e.g., use an attachment or exhibit). II. Timeline: This request will close on June 13, 2023, 3 PM EST Notes: 1. This Sources Sought is for planning purposes only, and does not constitute a commitment, implied or otherwise, that a procurement action will follow. The Department of Veterans Affairs will use the information submitted in response to this notice at its discretion and will not provide comments to any submission; however, The Department of Veterans Affairs reserves the right to contact any respondent to this notice for the sole purpose of enhancing The Department of Veteran Affairs understanding of the notice submission. 2. The content of any responses to this notice may be reflected in any subsequent solicitation, except for content marked or designated as business confidential or proprietary which will be fully protected from release outside the government. The Department of Veteran Affairs Contracting Office POC: Ann Marie Stewart Contracting Officer annmarie.stewart@va.gov
