Quintiles (NYSE:Q) has won a $1 million research grant to compare the effectiveness of treatments for uterine fibroids, a condition common among women of childbearing age.

The grant is part of $88.6 million in a second cycle of research funding from the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute. PCORI is a non-governmental body established by the passage of the federal Affordable Care Act in 2010 charged with researching health outcomes and the effectiveness of treatments.

While uterine fibroids are common in women of childbearing age, they are also more common in African American women. The condition is characterized by noncancerous tumors in the uterus that can cause discomfort. Treatments range from medication to hysterectomy, the removal of the uterus.

In studying uterine fibroids, Quintiles aims to fill a knowledge gap comparing the effectiveness of the various treatments. Dr. Richard Gliklich, president of Quintiles Outcome, the division of the Durham-based pharmaceutical services company that will be conducting the research, notes that more than $4 billion is spent annually in the United States to treat uterine fibroids but there is scant scientific evidence comparing the treatments.

“The clinical community needs better data to demonstrate the effectiveness, quality and value of treatments in real-world clinical practice,” Gliklich said in a statement. “With this research award we will compare patient outcomes after a variety of treatments, developing high-quality and clinically rich patient-level data to inform better care decisions.”

Quintiles Outcome is the division of the company that conducts real-world and late phase research. Outcome, based in Massachusetts, was the company Outcome Sciences that became part of Quintiles in a $177 million acquisition in 2011.

Outcome’s research will be led by Gliklich and supported by Penny Mohr, vice president of program development at the Center for Medical Technology Policy, and Evan Myers, a professor in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Duke University. The investigators will study more than 33,000 de-identified patient records from electronic medical records, claims data and data from integrated health care delivery systems. Among the questions that investigators want to answer is determining how long relief from symptoms lasts for treatments other than a hysterectomy.

The study will last two years.