Posts Tagged ‘Research’

Research misconduct ‘alive and well’ in UK

By Mike Broad - 14th January 2012 6:37 pm

Thirteen per cent of doctors or scientists have witnessed colleagues intentionally altering or fabricating data during their research for the purposes of publication, a survey finds.

The results suggest that research misconduct is alive and well in the UK and highlights the need for better systems to deter, detect, and investigate research misconduct.

Furthermore, 6% of 2,700 respondents said they are aware of possible research misconduct at their institution that has not been properly investigated.

Commenting on the BMJ research, Dr Fiona Godlee, the journal’s editor, said: “While our survey can’t provide a true estimate of how much research misconduct there is in the UK, it does show that there is a substantial number of cases and that UK institutions are failing to investigate adequately, if at all.

“The BMJ has been told of junior academics being advised to keep concerns to themselves to protect their careers, being bullied into not publishing their findings, or having their contracts terminated when they spoke out.”

They also reflect previous research among newly appointed consultants in seven UK hospitals. One in ten said they had first-hand knowledge of scientists or doctors intentionally altering or fabricating data, and 6% admitted to past personal research misconduct.

The survey was to inform a meeting involving the Committee on Publication Ethics which is striving for a consensus among institutions and funders towards tackling research misconduct.

COPE chair, Dr Elizabeth Wager, said: “This survey chimes with our experience from COPE where we see many cases of institutions not cooperating with journals and failing to investigate research misconduct properly.”

See the survey’s full results.

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Protect confidentiality in life sciences boost

By Mike Broad - 6th December 2011 11:01 am

Patient confidentiality must be protected as part of new government proposals to boost the life sciences industry say doctors’ representatives.

Data from patient records could be shared with private companies as part of a move to boost biomedical research. A consultation to change the NHS Constitution is being launched so that patient data is automatically included in clinical research, but with patients being given a clear opportunity to opt-out if they wish.

Dr Vivienne Nathanson, head of science and ethics at the BMA, commented: “The use of anonymised health data could benefit patients, but we are concerned that elements of the government’s proposals could, if implemented, undermine patient confidentiality.

“We are especially worried by recommendations that would grant researchers, possibly from large commercial companies rather than the patient’s healthcare team, access to patient records. This could mean that details of an individual’s health status and treatment will be revealed if researchers are able to search through records and identify patients in order to contact them.”

Patient representatives reacted more strongly, with Patient Concern’s Roger Goss saying it signified the “death of patient confidentiality”.

The aim to better use the vast amount of clinical data harvested from the three million patient contacts that occur each day in the NHS.

Ministers want to attract further investment to the life sciences sector in the UK, which is already worth £50bn a year and employs 160,000 people.

David Cameron also announced a £180m fund to boost translational research, turning laboratory breakthroughs into commercial products.

The government also wants to deploy remote medical devices - such as home-based equipment that can send details of the vital statistics of at-risk patients directly to doctors - to 3 million people over the next five years. And it wants to put in place a new ‘early access scheme’ which will put new drugs and technologies in NHS hospitals more quickly - particularly for brain and lung cancers.

NHS chief executive, Sir David Nicholson, said: “The challenges the NHS faces to improve quality and productivity in the coming years means spreading best practice fast is not an optional extra, it is an operational necessity.

“The review gives us the tools to do that job by removing the barriers to spreading innovation and creating new local partnerships - Academic Health Science Networks - to support delivery. It sets out areas where there are particular opportunities for improvement, for example putting technology in peoples’ homes to help them manage their own conditions. It represents a call to action for everyone in the NHS to make innovation a central priority.”

Further measures recommended include the launch a new app and web portal providing a database of where clinical trials are going on. Members of the public will be able to log in and ask to participate. And a new requirement that all NICE Technology Appraisal recommendations are incorporated automatically into relevant local NHS formularies in a planned way that supports safe and clinically appropriate practice.

Minister for Universities and Science David Willetts said: “Our life sciences industry is a vital driver of growth and employs tens of thousands of people. But it is rapidly changing. We need to keep ahead of the game and make the UK one of the best places for companies to invest in innovation.

“To do this we need to create the right environment for scientists and business to work together and translate research into new, cutting-edge technologies and medicines. This will this boost our economy, create new jobs, and lead to better treatments for patients.”

The BMA’s Nathanson added: “It is encouraging that the government has recognised the importance of the life science industry to both the NHS and the wider UK economy. This vital sector already contributes significantly to the financial livelihood of our country and has the real potential to provide further benefits during this tough economic period. Patients also benefit from the new treatments and drugs that are devised by hard working clinical researchers.

“The BMA will be examining these proposals carefully. We believe that patient records must be kept confidential and be anonymised if they are to be used for research purposes unless explicit patient consent has been obtained.”

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Trainee-led research collaboratives in surgery

By Neil Foden, CT1 in General Surgery - 17th October 2011 9:46 pm

In the past couple of years, a number of trainee-led research collaboratives in surgery have appeared in various deaneries across the country, such as the Mersey, the West Midland and our own, the London Surgical Research Group (LSRG).

These collaboratives are made ‘by trainees for trainees’. In our experience they can serve as a useful forum for bouncing ideas off one another at all levels of training and provide access to senior support. This is most often done in an informal setting and tries to be as fun as possible.

A huge advantage of being part of a collaborative is that projects can be done in a number of centres by a large body of trainees who are willing to help one another. For example, a recent study was carried out that looked into junior trainees’ attitudes towards the European Working Time regulations. A large number of individuals were surveyed and the data was complete within one month.

This multicentre approach would be much more difficult, if not impossible had such a system not been in place. The various collaboratives are by no means remote from one another and efforts are underway to integrate and pool our respective resources.

Research, and in particular publishing, has become a source of stress to surgical trainees especially for those looking for those increasingly elusive training numbers. There is a temptation to publish anything so long as the result is a name picked up on a PubMed search.

But surely this is not how it should be. Involvement in research or writing up any article for that matter would be best not done for the sake of it. It is clear that some are either not cut out for rigorous research or that it does not interest them and this also poses a potential problem.

A research collaborative is one answer to some concerns. It can allow trainees to immerse themselves in a project or just take a dip. A central point to all of this is that research needs to be enjoyable and something people want to do rather than just becoming yet another tick box exercise.

The LSRG is a trainee-led research collaborative that already counts over 200 members. Membership is free and open to everyone, regardless of level of surgical training or specialty. Members are able to run high quality multicentre trials by harnessing the natural network of trainees. This is a great way to get into research that delivers significant results. It provides a forum for ambitious members to start up new projects and disseminate to centres across London and the South East and it is also an environment in which more established researchers can offer their support and experience.

When trainees rotate to their next post, the group easily allows handing over of the project, ensuring that more studies are likely to succeed. This ethos enables a rich culture in which innovation can flourish with the added bonus of boosting one’s CV.

Although the LSRG and other collaboratives can’t guarantee your name as first author on a multi-centre RCT, they do however make that possibility more achievable and can be great fun in the process.

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Clinical Trials Directive slowing medical research

By Mike Broad - 26th September 2011 9:28 pm

Leading medical research organisations are calling on the European Union to reform the way clinical trials are regulated.

Disproportionate regulation of European clinical trials is hampering research into potentially lifesaving treatments - without enhancing patient safety - according to 16 organisations.

The joint statement to the European Commission and members of the European Parliament outlines how the European Clinical Trials Directive - which sets out the legal requirements for conducting clinical trials throughout the European Union - should be revised to help streamline the approval process for clinical trials.

The organisations involved include Cancer Research UK, the Academy of Medical Sciences, the British Heart Foundation, the Wellcome Trust and the European Science Foundation.

The directive provides a standardised framework which sets out how clinical trials investigating the safety or efficacy of a medicinal product in humans must be conducted throughout the European Union.

It’s interpreted differently throughout Europe with evidence that those undertaking trials go above and beyond the requirements to ensure they are compliant. This can cause unnecessary bureaucracy and makes it increasingly difficult for researchers to undertake multi-national trials, the organisations say.

The knock-on effect of this has been a significant increase in the average cost and time it takes for trials to get up and running, with an estimated 65% increase in the time it takes researchers to get approval for their studies, and a 75% increase in administrative costs.

Professor Sir John Bell, president of the Academy of Medical Sciences, said: “Health research must be subject to proportionate regulation that both protects patients and facilitates globally-competitive research. The current regulation of clinical trials in Europe is causing unnecessary delays and complexity which is stifling medical advances, without additional benefits to patient safety.

“We must make changes to clarify the scope of the current European Directive and stop a one-size-fits-all approach to trial regulation.”

The statement has been timed to brief MEPs at the start of the new parliamentary year and ahead of a revised directive which is expected to be published in mid-2012.

Professor Peter Johnson, Cancer Research UK’s chief clinician, added: “The huge expansion of paperwork has not helped to make research better or safer, just slower and more expensive. Simple steps, like reducing duplication and providing clearer more detailed rules can correct this without compromising standards.

“It’s essential that European institutions and governments take action against over-regulation of clinical trials, to ensure that patients and the public can continue to reap the benefits from the world-class research taking place throughout the UK and Europe.”

The other organisations supporting the call include the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer, European Clinical Infrastructures Network, International Brain Tumour Alliance, Society for Paediatric Oncology in Europe, the KKS Network of Clinical trials in Germany, the Medical Research Council, Association of British Pharmaceutical Industry, Academy of Medical Sciences, Arthritis Research UK, Association of Medical Research Charities and European Cancer Organisation.

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Looking beyond the headlines on the box

By Bob Bury - 31st August 2011 9:51 am

Well, I thought someone else was sure to write about this, but they haven’t.

Were you as alarmed as me to see the headlines telling us that every hour spent watching TV reduces your life expectancy by 22 minutes? It wasn’t the content of the headline that alarmed me, it was the knowledge that if I read further, I would find yet another example of dodgy ‘research’ and shite journalism which would raise my blood pressure to a dangerous degree, but that I would have have to read it anyway. And so it proved.

The Australian researchers had analysed the results of a large population lifestyle study (the Australian Diabetes, Obesity and Lifestyle Study), looking at data collected between 1999-2008. They concluded that watching six hours of TV a day reduces life expectancy by 4.8 years, compared with freaks who don’t watch any TV (I wonder how many of those there were? I don’t know because I could only be arsed to read the abstract).

Now that’s bad enough, given that if you’re watching TV you clearly aren’t taking exercise at the same time, unless you’re tuned in to the porn channel. If you watch six hours a day, you probably aren’t taking any exercise at all, other than trips to the fridge for more beer during the adverts, and that can’t be good for you, can it, regardless of whether you’re looking at the TV or at the empty space in the corner where any right-thinking person would put a set ?

I can’t believe that they isolated TV-watching as an independent variable, unless they had a large control group who watched no TV, but also took no exercise and had a rubbish diet. And even if they did, there’s another aspect of the results that wasn’t reported in The Telegraph (shame on you) or Mail (to be expected). If you look at the confidence limits (or the uncertainty interval as they call it, in line with recent trends), you get some idea of their data quality. That 4.8 hour figure has a 95% uncertainty interval of 11 days to 10.4 years. In other words, the TV effect could be bugger all or a decrement of a decade.

If we read a paper on the effects of a new drug with that degree of uncertainty, NICE would want to wait for a bigger, better study before approving it. Still I suppose that trying to explain confidence limits to a Mail reader would be a pretty thankless exercise.

They then piled uncertainty on uncertainty by producing that meaningless 22 minute figure. They must have known that this would be the number that appeared in the headlines. Of course, what they are saying is that if six hours per day in front of the telly has the effect they claim, then each hour of viewing would be responsible for 22 minutes of life lost for that particular cohort of sad losers. What it doesn’t mean is that if a slim, normotensive paragon of lifestyle virtue like myself sits down for an hour to watch an improving documentary on BBC2, I’ll be scything 22 minutes off my natural span. But that will, of course, be how it is interpreted by most readers.

As Jerry would say, what a load of arse!

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More support needed for surgical research

By Mike Broad - 17th June 2011 11:08 am

Failure to support surgical research will damage patient care in the future, a study warns.

The report, by the Royal College of Surgeons, says NHS patients are missing out on groundbreaking new procedures and cures because of a lack of surgical research.

A funding bias towards drug therapies; slow uptake of new techniques by surgeons and the NHS; and a lack of defined career pathways, mentors and role models for aspiring surgical researchers are among the issues raised.

In 2009, just 11 surgical trials were funded by the Medical Research Council and the National Institute of Health Research combined, despite one in four NHS procedures being surgical. Surgery cures more cancers than any other form of intervention, including radiotherapy and chemotherapy, says the report, and the RCS believes that the continued development and research into these types of curative treatments is vital.

Among the report’s recommendations is a call for the government to undertake a full review of public funding of translational research in surgery. Currently, only 1.5% of the £1.5billion government funding of medical research goes into surgical research.

Other recommendations include the Department of Health and surgical profession exploring how best to spread information on new technologies throughout the NHS; the Commissioning Board using all available means to encourage the spread of surgical innovation; and, participation in relevant established clinical audits being mandated through commissioning contracts.

The report also highlights the difficulty the profession faces in halting the decline in surgeons interested in carrying out research. With pressure to treat as many patients as possible, surgical training currently focuses on clinical roles within the NHS. Surgical associations need to explore what scope is available for understanding and conducting research in the surgical curriculum, the report says.

Professor Norman Williams, president-elect of the Royal College of Surgeons, said the report’s recommendations are a starting point for research funders, politicians and surgeons to work together to develop surgical innovation.

He commented: “In the past decade alone we have seen surgical procedures become safer, less invasive and more effective, both clinically and financially. The current funding bias towards medical research needs to be addressed.

“We cannot afford to neglect the kind of research that has brought, among others, cures for many forms of cancer, keyhole surgery, advancement in transplant surgery and the rapid developments we are now seeing in robotic surgery.”

The report also calls on the Commissioning Board to publish annual updates on which new proven techniques have been adopted in NHS practice, and research modules incorporated into surgical training.

Professor Martin Birchall, consutlant surgeon, laryngologist and pioneer of laryngeal and stem cell transplantation, added: “For innovation to become a widespread part of new clinical practice, a large amount of effort, time and cost needs to go into detailed laboratory work, meeting the public safety requirements, and finally performing often difficult clinical trials. The latter body of work can seem so daunting that the amazing group of innovator-surgeons we are gifted with in the UK can often be discouraged from taking their ideas and science into the clinic.

“The need to link world-class science in our internationally top-performing universities to saving the lives of surgical patients means that these challenges are not only important, but urgent.”

Read the full report.

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Agency needed to speed up research approvals

By Mike Broad - 12th January 2011 10:59 am

Red tape is stifling medical research, a review claims.

The report, by the Academy of Medical Sciences, says urgent changes are required to the regulation and governance of health research in the UK to avoid unnecessary delays.

It proposes a new regulatory and governance pathway which is less complex and aimed at increasing the speed at which healthcare innovations become available to patients.

A new independent Health Research Agency should be established to bring together existing approval processes. The agency would work with regulatory and governance bodies in the devolved nations to develop an integrated approvals system for the UK.

The report also recommends that the Department of Health should establish a new National Research Governance Service for England, to be housed within the HRA. The governance service would facilitate rapid approval of research studies conducted in single or multiple NHS sites by assuming responsibility for all study-wide checks that are currently duplicated by each participating NHS trust.

Professor Sir Michael Rawlins, chair of the Academy of Medical Sciences working group that prepared the report, said: “A fertile research environment is vital for the health and wealth of the UK. The current system of regulation is making it increasingly difficult to initiate health research in the UK and is preventing patients from participating in studies.

“This is ultimately denying patients early access to new drugs and hindering improvements to public health for the wider society. We have found unequivocal evidence that health research in this country is being jeopardised by a regulatory and governance framework that has become unnecessarily complex and burdensome. Further, we received no evidence that this increased regulatory and governance burden has led to enhanced safeguards for participants in research.”

The UK has created nearly a quarter of the world’s top 100 medicines and its share of world citations in both the clinical and health sciences is currently second only to the US. However, recent data show a decline in the UK’s global share of clinical research activity.

The health secretary welcomed the report’s idea of streamlining the process, even though the review was commissioned by the last government.

He said: “National regulation and local governance of health research are too complex and scattered across too many different bodies. The government welcomes the report and will consider carefully how to implement its recommendations.”

Sir Michael added: “The delay in obtaining NHS permissions is a major failure of the current pathway and is the biggest single barrier to all types of health research studies. There is a highly inefficient emphasis on process rather than outcomes, which has led to delays of over a year to gain permissions for simple studies.”

Read the full report.

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Doctors warned about research responsibilities

By Mike Broad - 20th April 2010 11:55 am

Doctors involved in clinical research have to ensure patients fully understand the risks and benefits of taking part and to be aware of their legal and ethical responsibilities, a defence body has warned.

Last week, the GMC launched new guidance called Good Practice in Research and Consent to Research, which set out the good practice principles that doctors are expected to understand and follow if they are involved in research.

The MDU claims to receive numerous enquiries from doctors about research. Common questions include how much information to give to patients taking part, with whom information from trials should be shared, whether data should be included in the patient’s records and about indemnity arrangements.

Dr Udvitha Nandasoma, an MDU medico-legal adviser, says doctors involved in research need to be aware of the wide ranging new GMC guidance.

“Clinical research is vitally important for improving healthcare. However, the outcome of each individual trial may be uncertain and it is important that participants in clinical research are fully aware of the risks they might be undertaking and give informed consent.

“It is vital that patients are given enough information about what is involved, including any potential risks, in way they can understand and the GMC says this will usually be backed up with information leaflets about the trial and, if appropriate, a copy of the protocol approved by the ethics committee.”

Doctors involved in trials also need to understand their legal obligations, the defence body says. For example, the Medicines for Human Use (Clinical Trials) Regulations 2004 state that clinical trials must have authority from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and approval by local research ethics committees. It is also a legal requirement for participants to give written consent.

While the pharmaceutical company, university or medical school that is sponsoring a clinical trial will usually provide indemnity for any injury that occurs as a result of a clinical trial, such as an unexpected side-effect of a drug, the MDU advises doctors to check that this is the case before the trial begins.

Read the GMC guidance in full.

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Academics must protect their jobs from cuts

By Francesca Robinson - 28th January 2010 9:22 am

Medical academics are being advised to have proper job plans and regular appraisal in order to protect their jobs from funding cuts.  

“We are anticipating a very tough time ahead for many medical schools and academics because of the current economic crisis,” warned the BMA’s medical academic staff committee co-chair Professor Michael Rees.

At the beginning of January Imperial College London made 21 medical academics redundant as part of a restructuring to tackle a £28m deficit. 

Another 14 academics are currently facing redundancy at the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College London, which has a £5m hole in its budget.

“There is certainly an increase in the generalised threat to academic employment. I can’t quantify the level of that threat but there certainly is a threat,” said Rees.

A three-pronged funding squeeze is putting a strain on medical school budgets. All university budgets will be affected by a £400m funding cut in 2010-11, announced by business, innovation and skills secretary Lord Mandelson in December. Some medical schools will also lose money because of a redistribution of funds following the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) and a review of the Multi Professional Education and Training (MPET) levy currently being conducted by the Department of Health.

The MPET review is looking to more fairly distribute funds for clinical training. The MPET levy is likely to be replaced with a tariff-based system where the funding follows the student or the trainee.

The BMA fears that this will not equate to posts following the students and could result in academic jobs being axed. Traditional medical schools, particularly those in London, which employ more staff than the newer medical schools, are likely to suffer most from any reallocation of funds.

“The threatened redundancies at the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s are particularly unfortunate because it’s a high flying department, was shown to be a very productive department in the RAE and is an important site for academic training,” said Rees.

He added that the chances of academics finding work by either moving to other universities or NHS jobs were very slim in the current economic climate.

The BMA is publishing new job planning guidance for academics, which will advise them to ensure they have a job plan which clarifies the work they do. They should undergo regular appraisals and ensure they know exactly where the funding for their joint contracts between universities and the NHS is coming from. They are also being advised to avoid any dubious fixed term contracts and to carefully check terms and conditions before accepting any job.

A spokeswoman for Imperial College said they had now agreed a new structure for their Faculty of Medicine that would safeguard their internationally leading research and education activities, and address a significant projected deficit of 28.7m by 2013/14. The deficit was caused by rising salary costs, a cut in central funding and “the difficult economic climate that universities are now operating in”.

“Staff identified as holding posts that were at risk were fully consulted during the process, and every effort was made to avoid compulsory redundancies. In total, 21 academic members of staff and 27 support staff have regretfully been made redundant,” she said.

Read a blog on the future of medical research sector.

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A plan for rescuing the UK’s medical research sector

By Mike Broad - 17th January 2010 11:26 am

Academy of Medical Sciences (AMS) has contacted the major political parties ahead of the general election to outline its vision for UK medical science.

It claims that groundbreaking advances in medical science offer the next government an unprecedented opportunity to reinvigorate the economy, to enhance the productivity of the NHS and to make public services more cost-effective.

Professor Sir John Bell, president of the AMS, said: “We believe that making medical science a central pillar of government policy will produce a flourishing UK economy and alleviate the burden of ill health on patients and public services.”

The UK has historically supported vibrant research-intensive medical science industries and internationally renowned academic medical research centres as part of its knowledge economy. It generates over 10% of the world’s clinical science and health research outputs and has created nearly a quarter of the world’s top 100 medicines.

Historically, both larger pharmaceutical and smaller biotechnology companies have flourished in the UK, where the availability of skilled researchers and a unified health system present a significant advantage for both basic and clinical research.

However, the report warns that the future of commercial medical research in the UK is under serious threat and much activity has already moved abroad. It says that between 2000 and 2006, the proportion of the world’s clinical trials conducted in the UK fell from 6% to 2%, in part because of more attractive regulation and incentives elsewhere.

“The UK’s competitors, including the USA, China, Canada and Singapore, have begun to realise the huge potential of medical research to both their economies and public services, and are implementing robust policies to grow this crucial sector. Decisive action is needed now to attract and anchor increasingly mobile medical researchers and life science industries in the UK,” it urges.  

The report sets out seven important challenges that must be tackled to reap the rewards from recent investment in medical science:

1. To benefit patients the NHS must become a willing participant in health research

A unified health system offers a unique advantage as a resource for medical research and innovation. High-quality research should be an integral component of the next NHS Operating

Framework; it should be an outcome on which the performance of NHS trusts is measured; and should be a central goal of any system for electronic health records.

2. The regulatory environment is driving medical science abroad

The combined regulatory requirements of the EU Clinical Trials Directive, European Medicines Agency, Medicine and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, NHS ethics committees, R&D offices in NHS trusts, the National Information Governance Board and other agencies are stifling R&D in both the private and public sector.

Regulation must be proportionate to the risks involved. We should lead the world in creating a proportionate, risk-based regulatory framework for medical research involving patients, which is fit for purpose and informed by an independent review of existing regulations.

3. Innovative incentives must firmly root the medical science industries in the UK

Investment in novel therapeutics, diagnostics and devices, should be encouraged through flexible pricing, public procurement strategies, tax incentives and new pathways to support uptake and access to medicines. Alliances should also be encouraged between the NHS, universities and industry to share the risks and rewards of new products.

4. Publicly funded health research needs further coordination

Maintaining a ring fence around the budgets held by the Medical Research Council and the National Institute for Health Research would help, as would better coordination of their work.

5. Public health challenges must become cross-departmental priorities

Effective public health research and delivery can provide enormous economic and health benefits to the UK, but are hindered by under-investment and fragmented responsibility and oversight. The UK lacks the necessary co-ordination to tackle health inequalities and major public health challenges such as obesity, infectious pandemics, ageing, alcohol and climate change.

Budgets and strategies need to be established for specific public health priorities that fund research and service delivery across government departments.  

6.  Health research should be used as a driver of foreign policy and international development

Medical science can underpin cost effective international development measures that enable poorer countries to address their health needs and help to reduce health and security threats to the UK.

Greater efforts are made by the government to support indigenous research capacity in resource-poor countries.

7. We must grow and sustain its world-class biomedical workforce

There needs to be better coordination of efforts to build biomedical research capacity, focusing on developing interdisciplinary researchers and workers in key areas of current and future need. Biomedical research training for doctors needs to be supported and the mobility of researchers across academic, industry and healthcare sectors incentivised.

The report provides a much needed rallying cry for academic medicine during a challenging time. The big medical research centres are under pressure to make cuts, and both Kings College and Imperial have made researchers redundant recently.

Earlier this year a study revealed that, while overall staff numbers have stabilised, the workforce profile is ageing, top heavy and male dominated. Certain specialties that were previous academic strongholds have also been decimated.

Sir John said: “A government that unites researchers from across academia, the NHS, industry and the charitable sector, and engages with patients and the public, can make significant progress towards addressing these challenges within five years.

“Bold leadership is needed to ensure that the UK can continue to generate world class medical science that is translated into health and wealth benefits. Generous donations to medical research charities and enthusiastic backing of the NHS indicate strong UK public support for medical science. The next government must respond to this chorus of public approval by placing medical science at the heart of its agenda.” 

Read an article on how to get into medical research.

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