”la Caixa” Foundation Call for Applications: first edition of the HealthCare Research call.

”la Caixa” Foundation launches the first edition of the HealthCare Research call, which aims to fund research that advances the design and evaluation of healthcare interventions in health promotion and disease prevention. 

Proposals should:

• Take an applied approach to real-world health issues
• Employ rigorous, validated methodologies
• Integrate, when relevant, perspectives from multiple research disciplines and professionals
• Show a clear pathway to scalability

Areas of interest include but are not limited to: mental health; women’s health; child and adolescent health; nutrition and healthy lifestyles; healthy ageing; and management of chronic conditions.

Proposals must be submitted in one of the following three proposal categories:

• Pilot studies: small-scale preliminary studies on health interventions, aimed at evaluating the feasibility and appropriateness of a larger-scale intervention. They can receive up to €80,000. Maximum duration of up to 2 years.
• Retrospective evaluations: research proposals that evaluate the effectiveness and impact of existing health interventions. They can receive up to €150,000. Maximum duration of up to 2 years.
• New interventions: research proposals that develop and evaluate new healthcare interventions. They can receive up to €300,000. Maximum duration of up to 3 years.

Applicants:

• Host Organizations (HO): non-profit research organizations based in Spain or Portugal. The Project Leader (PL) is the principal investigator at the HO and who submits the proposal and coordinates overall execution of the project.
• Partner organizations: non-profit organization located in any country that performs activities in the project and has budget allocated. Research organizations with the same NIF or VAT number will be considered one sole organization.
• Participant organizations: any organization participating in the proposal —including the Host and the partner organizations— with or without budget (for example, primary health centres).
• Civil Society Organizations (CSO): both individual projects and research consortia may also include up to 3 non-profit civil society organizations that are not engaged in research as part of their usual activity (e.g. patients’ associations).
• Companies: cannot be members of the project team, but may receive funds for subcontracted services.

The sum of the budgets of all the organizations not located in Spain or Portugal may constitute no more than 30 % of the total project budget.

In all cases, the proposed intervention must be conducted in Spain or Portugal.

Read more here.

Application deadline, 25th of February 2026, at 2pm CET.