Investigator Initiated Clinical Trials

Investigator Initiated Clinical Trials

Supports Danish hospital teams with non-commercial clinical trials to improve patient care.

The Novo Nordisk Foundation's Investigator Initiated Clinical Trials programme funds larger non-commercial clinical trials anchored at Danish hospitals, with the explicit goal of improving patient treatment through rigorous evidence from new medicines, technologies, or care routines. Both monocentric and multicenter national trials are eligible; for multicenter international trials, the coordinating investigator and the trial itself must be anchored at a Danish hospital. Trials with industrial or commercial purpose are categorically excluded. All funded trials must comply with GCP guidelines, include a detailed protocol with power calculations and a statistical analysis plan, be registered at ClinicalTrials.gov or CTIS, and make anonymised data available via Zenodo or equivalent at trial completion. Randomised controlled trials are preferred; non-randomised designs are accepted.

The award range is DKK 6 million to DKK 22 million per grant over three to five years, from a total pool of DKK 89 million for the 2026 cycle. The call opens 9 June 2026 and closes 18 August 2026 at 2:00 pm Copenhagen time; results are announced at the end of December 2026. The programme is expected to recur in June 2027. The main applicant must hold an MD and hold a specialist physician appointment at the Danish hospital where the trial is anchored; documented research leadership is required. Postdocs, PhD students, and employees of the applicant institution cannot serve as co-applicants. Holders of an active NNF IICT grant may reapply only in their final project year and cannot hold two overlapping grants.

Applications may be submitted before all legal and ethical approvals are obtained, but the grant cannot be activated until approvals are in place. Industry-sponsored materials require a written agreement confirming data ownership and publication rights before the deadline. The programme is overseen by the Committee on Clinical and Translational Medicine. For queries, contact Ursula Bach (urba@novo.dk) or Jens Peter Holst Lauritsen (jlrt@novo.dk); applications are submitted via the NNF Norma portal.