Our vision is for high-quality health and social care research that improves people’s health and wellbeing, and our core purpose is to protect and promote the interests of patients and the public in health and social care research.
To achieve this we:
- make sure that research is ethically reviewed and approved
- promote transparency in research
- oversee a range of committees and services
- coordinate and standardise research regulatory practice and
- provide independent recommendations on the processing of identifiable patient information where it is not always practical to obtain consent, for research and non-research projects.
You can find out more about our work and what we do on this website, in our monthly newsletter HRA Latest and via social media.
We are one of a number of organisations that work together in the UK to regulate different aspects of health and social care research.
Most of our functions apply to research undertaken in England, but we also work closely with the other countries in the UK to provide a UK-wide system.
We are an arm’s length body of the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), which means the Government has devolved some of its responsibilities to us. We have our own budget and Board, but are accountable to DHSC.