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Health & Social Care Research Across North East & North Cumbria.

Primary Care

Primary Care

Primary care has a very important place within the wider research system, providing the ideal research setting to access a broad range of participants to contribute to the evidence base across a wide range of specialties.

Studies within primary care settings can address disease diagnosis, prevention and management of long term and chronic conditions, as well as the treatment of common conditions, such as flu.

Primary care research also promotes a healthier lifestyle for patients, which in turn helps manage chronic conditions and prevent ill-health in the future.

As a specialty and a setting, primary care has a pivotal role to play across our region in making clinical research a more democratic endeavour and addressing the health inequalities that we all care so much about.

Useful terminology

Primary care networks are GP practices working together with community, mental health, social care, pharmacy, hospital and voluntary services to strive towards more proactive, personalised, coordinated and integrated health and social care.

A GP federation is a group of GP practices that works together to provide health services and improve patient experience. They share best practice and harmonise documentation and processes for the benefit of all the practices in the federation.

A Participant identification Centre (PIC) is where an organisation identifies participants through patient records for possible participation in studies. PIC sites can inform patients directly about studies, such as via email or text messaging. A site can only be a PIC if the research is being conducted elsewhere, such as at an NHS hospital or a university.

How to get involved

Explore

Find out what's happening in primary care research across the country via the NIHR's national specialty page.

Read the strategy

Familiarise yourself with the NIHR Clinical Research Network Primary Care Strategy and share it with your colleagues. The document describes the direction for expanding research activity in primary care settings through the NIHR and organisations work across the primary care landscape.

Get in touch

Get in touch with your local NIHR Clinical Research Network, where you can ask about the strategy or tell us about any research ideas or initiatives you have. The team will be happy to help!

Contact your professional body

If you are a registered healthcare professional, take a look at the Royal College of General Practitioners and the support they have on offer to ensure GP practices are ‘research ready’.

Funding opportunities

Explore funding opportunities within primary care. Could any of your research proposals fit with the funding currently on offer?