£73,000 of professional development grants are being awarded to Oxford’s nurses, midwives, allied health professionals and research practitioners to develop skills that will support them to research new and improved ways of delivering healthcare to patients and service users.
The 26 grants are part of an Oxford Academic Health Partners (OAHP) Research Development Awards Scheme for healthcare sector professionals who are typically underserved by funded development opportunities in clinical research.
Commenting on the scheme, which is the first to be run by the partnership, Professor Keith Channon, OAHP Director, said “This highly competitive awards scheme is supporting nurses, midwives and allied health professionals across OAHP who aspire to develop and lead evidence-based quality improvement projects in their speciality, so they can acquire the research skills and expertise to drive forward innovation in our NHS services.”
The awards include a £2,675 grant to Occupational Therapist Chloe Woodley, who is a Deputy Team Manager in Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS).
Chloe will undertake training in health research methods with the University of Oxford’s Department for Continuing Education, which will support her and her team to develop new ways to care for young people with complex needs in Oxford.
“I am keen to support CAMHS services to develop, and feel the training will support me to be more up to date with research methods, to be able to have a better understanding of gathering research to aid service improvement and to support me to develop the service to its full potential.”
Sam Monks, Physiotherapist Team Lead for Neuroscience Critical Care at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, has received £2,240 for a health research methods course at Oxford Brookes University. Sam will research how best to provide rehabilitation for patients with acquired and traumatic brain injury and assess the possibility of developing guidelines to move towards gold-standard care.
“Following a traumatic or acquired brain injury, the road to recovery can feel like an uphill struggle. There are currently no guidelines regarding how often and how much rehabilitation these patients should receive, and as a result, there is a wide range of the intensity to which these patients receive rehab.”
Working across Oxford’s academic and NHS organisations, OAHP is dedicated to expanding the region’s capacity for health and care innovation, improved training and cross-sector research, with a priority to develop clinical academic pathways for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals.
The OAHP Research Development Award Scheme is jointly funded by the Oxford Academic Health Partners Charity, NIHR Oxford Biomedical Research Centre, NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre, and the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration Oxford and Thames Valley.