Southampton Academy of Research (SoAR) has helped a new wave of non-medical healthcare professionals to take the next step in their research careers as clinical academics.
New funding, awarded by Health Education England (HEE) and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), will enable a new set of healthcare professionals in Southampton to develop a career as a clinical academic.
Specifically intended for healthcare professionals (other than doctors and dentists), the HEE-NIHR Integrated Clinical Academic Programme provides dedicated funding to allow them to split their time between seeing patients and conducting research.
This success was supported by SoAR, a joint initiative by the University of Southampton and University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust that provides free support and advice for staff and students looking to develop their career in research.
Supporting success
The support and advice provided by SoAR enabled five researchers to be awarded a pre-doctoral clinical academic fellowship (PCAF) and three researchers an ICA bridging scheme.
Daniel Osborne, an orthoptist, who first thought to apply after it was recommended by SoAR, said, “I’m delighted to have been awarded a PCAF, which I intend to use to conduct research to investigate how technology could help improve patch therapy for children with a lazy eye.
“I feel this is a very significant first step into a clinical academic career where I hope to positively impact patient care.”
Amanda Harris, a clinical nurse specialist who was also awarded a PCAF, plans to use it to research ways to improve the diagnosis and management of primary ciliary dyskinesia, a rare genetic disease that affects patients’ lungs.
“SoAR supported me from the very start, offering advice that helped me progress through the ICA pathway from an internship and a team award, to a research fellowship and now to a pre-doctoral clinical academic fellowship,’ said Amanda.
Taking the next step
While many of those offered awards are embarking on a research career for the first time, the bridging award offered to Dr Sarah Bailey and Becky Bonfield will enable them to take the next step in their already well established careers as clinical academics.
The HEE/NIHR transitional/bridging award allows researchers to set aside the time needed to develop a comprehensive and well-planned application to take the next step along the clinical academic career pathway.
Dr Sarah Bailey is the lead nurse specialist in recurrent miscarriage and clinical research specialist at UHS. Her research focuses on developing new ways to support women who have had recurrent miscarriages in early stages of a new pregnancy.
She has achieved significant recognition for her work, including receiving the Nurses award for her presentation ‘Hope for the best...but prepare for the worst’ at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology’s annual conference in 2017.
“Support from SoAR and in particular, supervision and guidance from Professor Alison Richardson in her capacity as director, has helped me significantly to develop my confidence and navigation skills to progress my clinical academic career,” she said.
Becky Bonfield, acute kidney injury (AKI) lead advanced nurse practitioner, said SoAR informed her about the opportunity to apply for the award and helped her get the right supervisory team in place to ensure success.
She intends to use the award to review the literature on the role that AKI patients have on improving their long term health. She then plans to use this to apply for a clinical doctoral research fellowship.
“I was really surprised and really pleased,” she said.
“I know some of the other award fellows and know that they are of a really high calibre so I felt proud that I was included in this cohort of successful fellows.”
Posted on Friday 18 October 2019