The Research Team
Hello and Welcome to the Research Team page of Team FORCE – Research. For this page we wanted to give you a chance to peer behind the curtain and find out what happens in the background on Research Trials and to give you a better understanding of what the Research Team do. Included on this page will be a breakdown of the role a research nurse plays, a video each from our governance and nursing teams and a few links to help you find out more information.
Our Governance Team give you a breakdown on what they do, how they get a trial up and running and how you could be involved.
Our research nurses talk about their role, its importance and why more people should think Research
Why become a Research Nurse?
Clinical research nurses play a vital role in delivering clinical research, and ultimately improving patient care and treatment pathways and helping to move clinical boundaries forward whilst helping to ensure equal access to new treatment opportunities.
The desire to be a research nurse usually comes from a passionate belief that healthcare needs to be evidence based and combines law, ethics, clinical care and working in complete partnership with research participants.
The role is incredibly diverse and involves far more than just recruiting patients onto a trial, they are also involved in follow-up appointments, they collect, interpret and maintain vast amounts of data and also have to have a great deal of knowledge on regulations, protocols and consent. Despite this complexity, the job is varied and interesting. Although the principal investigator (PI) has ultimate responsibility for any study, it is often research nurses who coordinate its day-to-day management. This means leadership and organisational skills and a flexible and adaptable approach are vital.
Day to day, the role of a research nurse may vary, as they hold numerous responsibilities. These can include: Identifying and screening potential patients, Making sure that patients have all the necessary information to allow them to make a fully informed decision about whether they want to participate in a study and presenting information to colleagues about what is happening in Research.
Healthcare can, for the majority of the time, be paternalistic with patients coming to us unwell and we do things to make them better; whereas in research the balance of power shifts considerably, we cannot achieve medical advances without help from patients (research participants). We work with them to assess the efficacy and safety of novel therapies and there is no guarantee that participating in a research study will be of benefit to the participant. In research, the safety and wellbeing of our participants is at the centre of everything we do and the research nurse is crucial to supporting them through the whole process of taking part in research.
Ultimately a research nurse plays a vital role in ensuring clinical studies run smoothly and that participants are safe, protected and fully informed acting as the patient advocate ensuring that the patient/participant needs come first.
If you would like to learn more about research, we’ve put together a few helpful links to get you started.
> For information on the different types of research, the NIHR have a great guide that explains everything in detail, you can find that here.
> If you’d like to learn more about possibly running your own study, click here.
> If your interested in how study support services are involved in Research, click here.
> If you want to find out more about research trials that are happening nationally, including those surrounding Covid19, take a look at the Be Part Of Research website, which you can find here.
“The very first requirement in a Hospital is that it should do the sick no harm.” ― Florence Nightingale