Our Research Strategy

Our research strategy is currently taking shape as we assess the new landscape for medical research in the UK. To get an understanding of our thought processes on T & O Research, please view our MindMap to the right of this page.

Over the last decade Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery Research has been through a challenging time. The change in the funding mechanism and the increasing financial stringency imposed on Universities has led to a loss of support for Trauma and Orthopaedic Academic Units even though the benefit given to our patients is huge and lasting. The burden of musculoskeletal disease is enormous and consumes a large share of the NHS funding but the investment in research (a minute proportion of the 1.5% going into surgical health research from the circa £3 billion medical research budget each year) does not match either the benefit given or the sheer numbers (1.6 million T&O operations in 2010) treated.

Accordingly we intend to focus attention on gaps in T&O research and develop a cohesive strategy for the future. The diagram below sets out our current thinking and we are asking the following six questions of our membership with an interest in research:

Six questions we need to find the answers for

Why is Trauma and Orthopaedic Surgery not better represented in the national funding of research either from the Medical Research Council, the National Institute for Health Research, or Non-Government streams?
Where do we see UK T&O research by 2018?
What are the barriers to us achieving this?
How can we overcome these barriers?
What are the three main research Questions we can address as an orthopaedic community over the next 5 years?
Which of these would you personally be most interested in working on?

The National Research Framework

The principal institutions setting the national research agenda are:

The National Institute for Health Research (NIHR)

The NIHR commissions and funds NHS, social care and public health research that is essential for delivering on the government’s responsibilities in public, health and personal social services.

The NIHR’s role is to develop the research evidence to support decision making by professionals, policy makers and patients, make this evidence available, and encourage its uptake and use, for example, through NHS Evidence, which provides clinical and non-clinical evidence and best practice, to make informed decisions. It is for other organisations, such as the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), to provide national guidance on promoting good health and preventing and treating ill health. The NIHR funds research, not implementation or service development.
The NIHR’s key objective is to improve the quality, relevance, and focus of research in the NHS and social care by distributing funds in a transparent way after open competition and peer review.
Accordingly the NIHR encourages initiatives that increase the potential for quality research to be widely disseminated and freely accessed. It supports the principle of Open Access to research as set out in its statement supporting UKPubMed Central. A UKPubMed Central video highlights the benefits of publishing research to this unique open access resource. In addition the NIHR also part-funds the EQUATOR Network which aims to enhance the reliability of medical research literature by promoting transparent and accurate reporting of health research.
The NIHR also funds a range of programmes addressing a broad range of health priorities. Funding is based on the quality and relevance of the research to personal social services and the NHS.

The Research Innovation Pathway

The chart to the right shows how major research programmes and initiatives fit into the 'innovation pathway' (please note that the chart is not a comprehensive representation of all NIHR initiatives and does not show formal relationships between programmes and organisations).

The pathway starts with the creation of an innovation, which includes basic research in a laboratory, through to its use in a patient care setting. It covers the full range of interventions, including pharmaceuticals, biologicals, biotechnologies, procedures, therapies and practices, for the full range of health and healthcare delivery such as prevention, detection, diagnosis, prognosis, treatment and care.

For more detail visit:

http://www.nihr.ac.uk/research/Pages/default.aspx

The Medical Research Council (MRC)

Over the next five years the Medical Research Council (MRC) aims to support medical research which increases the pace of the transition to better health. They will achieve this through four strategic aims:

1 Picking research that delivers: Setting research priorities which are most likely to deliver improved health outcomes.

2 Research to people: Bringing the benefits of excellent research to all sections of society.

3 Going global: Accelerating progress in international health research.

4 Supporting scientists: Sustaining a robust and flourishing environment for world-class medical research.

The MRC’s has identified two research priority themes:

Resilience, repair and replacement

Natural protection

Tissue disease and degeneration

Mental health and wellbeing

Repair and replacement

Living a long and healthy life

Genetics and disease

Life course perspective

Lifestyles affecting health

Environment and health

For more detail on the MRC visit:

http://www.mrc.ac.uk/Ourresearch/Priorities/index.htm

Joint Action, the fundraising research arm of the BOA

As well as working within all the National frameworks available, we have developed our own fundraising research arm to provide 'pump-priming' grants that enable the very best projects to gain invaluable patient data sets and go on to attract further funds from other major grant giving bodies. As an NIHR Strategic Partner and a member of the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC). The AMRC is a membership organisation of the leading medical and health research charities in the UK. Working with its member charities and partners, they aim to support the sector’s effectiveness and advance medical research by developing best practice, providing information and guidance, improving public dialogue about research and science, and influencing government. Our research platform was developed according to their best-practice guidelines and we have just had our first 5 year audit from which we passed with flying colours.

Joint Action achievements to date

We find that we have distributed just under £1.4million in research grants which, according to the grant recipients, has resulted in: 22 scientific papers published in peer reviewed scientific journals, 57 oral presentations or posters at international scientific meetings, 12 academic theses, and 7 projects producing proposals for clinical change to improve patient outcomes. Six grants (pump primers) have enabled researchers to apply successfully for further funds from other major grant giving bodies. For further information or to get involved, please visit Joint Action's own website directly.

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