Can you help us put people first in research?

We are looking for clinical researchers to join a project steering group to help improve how clinical research is done. You would take part in at least eight two-hour online steering group meetings. The meetings will run every four to six weeks between June 2022 and March 2023. We are also looking for eight people with lived experience of clinical research.

What is clinical research?

Clinical research is research that involves people and is focused on improving their health and care. Usually the people taking part in clinical research are patients, but not always. Often the research happens in a hospital or GP setting but it also occurs in other places, for example in people’s homes.

Why are we doing the ‘People-centred research project’?

• We want the UK to be a place where health and care for everyone is improved by outstanding clinical research.
• We think that clinical research is outstanding if the right research is done, and it is done in the right way. At the Health Research Authority, we are particularly interested in the second part of this: doing research in the right way.
• We want to make sure that the priorities and needs of the people who take part in clinical research, and the people who will be affected by the outcomes of the research, are central to how clinical research is done. This is described as being people-centred.

What is the ‘People-centred research project’?

• The project aims to find ways to make people-centred clinical research happen more often.
• The project will be collecting evidence about how high quality, people-centred clinical research is done well; finding out what matters most, what ‘good’ looks like and what might be making it difficult.
• We will make some recommendations and suggest some approaches to help improve the way clinical research happens in the UK
• The project and the steering group are supported by a small project delivery team that includes members of the Health Research Authority and the University of Lincoln. The University of Lincoln are providing academic support for the project.

What is the activity?

We are looking for eight people who work in clinical research to join a steering group with eight public contributors. You will help:

• decide what work this project undertakes
• interpret the information we collect and help us to understand what it means
• ensure the project stays true to its aims of being a people centred project
• oversee project progress
• publicise our findings and co-author reports and papers about this work
• shape our recommendations to the UK health research sector

Your experience

Your recent experience may be as a someone involved in delivering clinical research. You may be a clinical research lead, principal investigator, or a team member (for example a research nurse, clinical investigator or any other member of the research delivery team). You may be a clinical academic who has designed a clinical research project, or you may work in clinical research as part of a research and development (R&D) department, Clinical Trials Unit, Clinical Research Organisation, or life-sciences company.

What will be involved?

You will need to be free to attend at least eight two-hour online steering group meetings every four to six weeks between June 2022 and March 2023.

The first workshop will be on 23 June from 1 to 3pm, where you would join HRA staff and other members of the steering group for an initial online (Zoom) workshop to help us get to know each other and understand the work that the HRA has done so far on this project. Captions will be enabled for all Zoom meetings.

You will also be asked to read materials and to provide your comments, thoughts, and insights between meetings

Two co-chairs will be appointed to lead the meetings. We hope one will be a public contributor and the other will be someone who works in clinical research.

There are some things we already know that we need your insights and support with but we may identify more areas where your experience would add value. The members of the steering group will be able to identify and discuss these. As a member of the group, there is no expectation that you will be involved in any further work that we identify, unless you would like to do so. We plan to recruit enough people to the group to make it easy to share the work and avoid any individual feeling that they should take on more work than they are comfortable with.

What difference will I make?

We will have explored what people-centred research is, and what we can do to help researchers to ensure they are able to keep people at the centre of their work.

We will have collected examples of research that we think everyone will agree is people centred.

We will write a report together, to share what we have learned with the whole of the UK research community.

We will work together to find inclusive ways of sharing our findings with people who could become involved in research in the future

What support will I receive?

We have a small team at the HRA who will support your involvement throughout this project.

If you would like a short conversation with a member of the project team, then we can arrange that.

We will send you information about all the meetings in advance by email.

If you have any access needs you would like to make us aware of, please let us know. Meetings over one hour will have a scheduled 10-minute break.

What skills or experience do I need to take part in this opportunity?

You will be asked to contribute your views based solely upon your own experience, however we think it is important that:

• you have recent experience (within the last two years) of delivering clinical research
• you are comfortable and able to take part in remote meetings and reading documents
• you have experience with public involvement and ability to respect, listen and learn from different perspectives
• you are interested in shaping and improving clinical research
• you are not expected to represent anyone other than yourself during the meetings, however if you do have links to diverse community groups or networks of people underserved by clinical research, we would welcome your help to reach out more widely to inform our work
• you will be able to read project related documents before the meetings
• you can give feedback on meeting notes as required and provide input into any specific activities or questions
• you can reflect upon and contribute to any report or communication about the work or on the experience of your involvement in this project
• you can contribute opinions by email in between meeting

We are particularly interested in hearing from people with links to diverse communities and people with experience of serving under represented communities.

Co-chairs

Two people are invited to apply to be co-chairs and lead the meetings.

Ideally, we would like the co-chairs to be one public contributor and one member of the clinical research community.

Co-chairs will need to:

• work together to keep the group to time and ensure all the items on the agenda are discussed appropriately
• be prepared to meet in advance of meetings to discuss the agenda
• be comfortable with groups of people and able to ensure that everyone is heard
• flag any issues or concerns to the project delivery team

Co-chairs will be supported by the project delivery team and invited to meet virtually in advance of each meeting to plan the agenda. This should take approximately no more than one extra hour per meeting.

How do I apply?

To apply to be a member of the steering group, please email communications@hra.nhs.uk by noon on 6 June 2022.

In no more than 300 words, please let us know why you would like to get involved and how you meet the criteria above.

Please use 'people-centred clinical research' in the email subject line.

How do I apply to be a co-chair?

If you would like to apply to be the co-chair, please let us know, and also explain why you would be suitable for this role.

Who do I contact for further information?

Please contact communications@hra.nhs.uk or 0207 104 8164 if you have any questions.

Meetings