DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH
News Release issued by COI News Distribution Service. 14 October 2008
A new £5 million
research programme which is intended to lead to an increase in
service quality and patient safety through better ways of planning
and providing health services was announced today by Public Health
Minister Dawn Primarolo, during a visit to Southampton.
The new Health Services Research (HSR) programme will provide
funding across the country for a broader range of health services
research than is already covered by the National Institute for
Health Research (NIHR) programmes. These include the Health
Technology Assessment programme (HTA), the Service Delivery &
Organisation programme (SDO), the Efficacy & Mechanism
Evaluation programme (EME), Programme Grants for Applied Research
and the Research for Patient Benefit (RfPB) programme.
These programmes are all specialist sub-sets in the field of
health services research, which means that some projects may be
difficult to fund because they fall outside of established NIHR
funding streams, as well as those covered by the Medical Research
Council and the Department of Health.
The HSR programme will fund research mainly through a
researcher-led workstream, whereby grants are provided for both
primary and evidence synthesis on topics proposed directly by
researchers, on an ongoing basis. The programme may also advertise
calls for research proposals on specific topics. The first call
for expressions of interest will be taking place in January 2009.
For more details and to register your interest visit http://www.hsr.nihr.ac.uk
Dawn Primarolo said:
"Health services research produces knowledge that can lead
to the improvement of health policy, health systems, and health
care delivery, ultimately resulting in improvements in population
health. This area of research has already made a valuable
contribution to the improvement of health and health care in the
UK. With this new programme we are taking action to fund important
research where there is currently no alternative source of funding.
"The Government recognised the importance of health services
research in its national health research strategy Best Research
for Best Health, where one of the strategic goals is to commission
research focused on improving health and care. The Cooksey review
also highlighted the need for increased funding to support
research into the implementation of new products and approaches
into practice."
Professor Sally C. Davies, Director General of Research &
Development at the Department of Health said:
"All types of study designs appropriate to health services
research will be supported, which include both primary research
and evidence syntheses. Our early work with stakeholders has
highlighted a number of key areas likely to be of interest to this
new programme. These include cultural and organisational issues
around patient safety, making better use of existing research
knowledge through modelling, and the use of existing health data
to improve the planning and delivery of health services and systems."
Notes to editors
1. The NIHR Health Services Research (HSR) programme will have
two modes of operation. It will mainly work in researcher-led
'responsive' mode, but it may also make calls for
proposals in areas of particular interest, importance or strategic
need, to be approved by the programme's board. Such
commissioning may address precise research questions or broader
themed calls.
2. The HSR programme will use NIHR governance and management
processes. The programme will be led by a Programme Director, who
will be responsible to the Department of Health Director General
of Research and Development via the NIHR Director of Evaluation,
Trials and Studies. There will be consistency between the
management of the programme and other NIHR programmes, with
flexibility where needed to meet the specific needs of the HSR
programme. Further details about the call for research proposals
and the remit of the HSR programme are available from http://www.hsr.nihr.ac.uk
3. The NIHR HSR programme will be managed alongside other NIHR
programmes by the NIHR Evaluation, Trials and Studies
Co-ordinating Centre (NETSCC) based at the University of
Southampton. Further details about NETSCC and the programmes it
manages are available from http://www.netscc.ac.uk
4. The National Institute for Health Research provides the
framework through which the research staff and research
infrastructure of the NHS in England is positioned, maintained and
managed as a national research facility. The NIHR provides the NHS
with the support and infrastructure it needs to conduct
first-class research funded by the Government and its partners
alongside high-quality patient care, education and training. Its
aim is to support outstanding individuals (both leaders and
collaborators), working in world class facilities (both NHS and
university), conducting leading edge research focused on the needs
of patients. More information about the National Institute for
Health Research is available on its website at: http://www.nihr.ac.uk
5. The National Institute for Health Research's progress
report 'Transforming Health Research the first two
years' can be downloaded from the NIHR website at: http://www.nihr.ac.uk/about_progress_report.aspx
6. For further details please call the Department of Health press
office on: 020 7210 5221
ENDS