Research informs all elements of our work, irrespective of which service area or organisation we work in. It enables us to identify interventions, treatments, or best practice in order to improve the quality and type of service we provide.

We don't need to undertake research to become research minded: we all undertake evidence based practice on a daily basis, often without realising. By undertaking research training, however, it helps us to actively consider whether or not we can improve our individual work or service by identifying relevant research to guide us in making confident decisions in our everyday practice.

Research, innovation, and evaluation are vital to the future of the NHS health and care:

  • with staff involvement in research, new or improved treatments for our communities are possible
  • a research-minded workforce ensures that MPFT can be confident that we are offering our service users the best care based on research evidence

To achieve this, we believe all staff should have access to free research training to give them the tools they need which is why STARS (Supporting The Advancement of Research Skills) was developed.

Should you need any advice on the research training you need, please email stars@mpft.nhs.uk, or for more general research queries, research@mpft.nhs.uk.

Good Clinical Practice (GCP) Training

All clinical research is conducted to Good Clinical Practice (GCP), the international ethical, scientific and practical standard. As part of the UK Policy Framework for Health and Social Care Research GCP training is a requirement for all Researchers involved in the delivery of Clinical Trials of Investigational Products (CTIMPS). GCP compliance ensures the data for research studies is reliable and importantly ensures the rights, safety and wellbeing of participants.

The GCP training course is free to all NHS, UK universities and other publically funded organisations who support clinical research. The course can be accessed oneline through the NIHR website.

The training can be completed as a face to face or online Introduction to Good Clinical Practice (GCP) course. This should be refreshed every 3 years using the GCP refresher training.

 

Other training

On the NIHR learn website if you work for the NHS, a UK university or other a publically funded organisation that supports clinical research, you are able to access other training opportunities provided by the NIHR such as Informed consent.

 

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