NIH is located in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) with other health-related agencies of the federal government, including the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration, Health Care Financing Administration, and Health Resources and Services Administration. NIH is the primary agency for research on health, accounting for 94 percent of DHHS's budget for health research and development (calculated from data from the National Science Foundation [NSF; 1997a:Table 8]).

NIH, which traces its roots to 1887, has grown steadily in size and scope, especially since the end of World War II, when the National Cancer Institute (NCI) was the only separately organized entity and the budget was $3 million. Currently, in FY 1998, there are 21 institutes and centers addressing different aspects of health research and several other major organizational units, and the budget for all NIH institutes and centers (see Box 1-1) is $13.6 billion.

According to the NIH Manual (National Institutes of Health, 1994b), "The National Institutes of Health is the steward of biomedical and behavioral re-