CRP Bulletin - June 2022

I support CRP Registration campaign

Accredited Registration for Clinical Research Practitioners is a crucial basis to underpin the professional development of the CRP workforce. Some of the delegates from our national CRP Event in March identified that there is not enough support for the CRP registration from their organisations and managers. In July, we will be asking our supporters to step forward and become visible. The CRPs need to see that the system around them supports their development. We want to show everyone that the development of CRPs is on the agenda of our senior leaders as the CRP Registration benefits not only CRPs but also our organisations and strengthens the UK research delivery workforce now and in the future.

Help us identify, acknowledge and celebrate our supporters. We are looking for senior leaders, managers, and other professionals - if you support the professional development of CRPs please step forward and tell others why. If you would like to be involved in this campaign, please contact workforceandprofessionscrn@nihr.ac.uk We will explore the ways you could contribute and we will connect you with your local CRP Engagement Lead.

The campaign will run from week commencing the 18th July, including a tweet chat on Thursday 21st July. More details to follow.

The first registered CRP in Wales plus read NHS Research Scotland's response to the register

Sean Cutler, Research Officer, Research and Development Delivery Team, Aneurin Bevan University Health Board

When it was brought to my attention that there was an opportunity to attain a professional registration in the area of research, I felt it was essential to attain it for career progression. My role requires me to work independently across sites within the health board and I believe the registration will install confidence in non-research active staff that I am competent to be working with patients unsupervised. Every effort needs to be made for the CRP community to expand as it will highlight the role research plays in everyday healthcare even further. See Sean celebrating his registration on twitter https://twitter.com/ABUHB_Research/status/1539598883705217027

NHS Research Scotland describe the game changing impact of accreditation for CRPs.

Read the full article.

CRPs and Post Graduate training

Hello, my name is Maxine Berry and I work as a Project Support Manager and the first Registered Clinical Research Practitioner within Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust Bioresource team.

Funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) the Bioresource team has established groups of healthy volunteers and patients with common or rare diseases who have provided samples (of blood, saliva or other) and agreed to be recalled by genetic make-up (genotype) and/or physical characteristics (phenotype) to participate in medical research and trials. By donating a sample, participants will help the future development of healthcare and the long-term prevention and treatment of disease by enabling researchers to greater understand how genes affect a variety of diseases and illnesses.

My clinical role as a CRP can be a very busy role, but is always interesting, as we have a variety of project sites open which means we work in a number of different clinical areas. However, as a manager I am also very busy, this role requires me to engage with clinicians and other key stakeholders as well as providing leadership to the team, human resources, robust pathways of consent and public engagement.

We work closely with clinicians to identify eligible patients, who we then approach and receive informed consent from if they are happy to take part, before obtaining a sample from them. It feels great to be able to provide a patient-centred service and spend the extra time with research participants to explain the importance of studies like the BioResource.

Because my role involves delivering research and leadership I felt it was important to develop those skills, so with the support of my educational lead, Karl Ward, I applied for the PG Cert Leading Clinical Research Delivery and I was accepted and given a full bursary to cover the expense of the program. I applied for this course for two reasons, because I am a leader and second because I lead a large translational study. The course will provide me with a foundation of evidenced based educational formats and workplace-based learning. I will develop key knowledge, skills and behaviours to enable me to demonstrate capability as a clinician researcher when delivering research within my own practice. Moreover, I will also develop practice experience during the Research Practice Experience (RPE) module.

Additionally, the course will also teach skills such as scoping current evidence and maximising the potential of routinely collected data, to tasks such as project planning and budget management. Finally, I will also learn about different research studies and how to improve participant recruitment. I am very excited about being one of the first students to attend this course and I am looking forward to learning new things and developing myself as a research leader.

To find out more about the Leeds BioResource team and to sign up to be a volunteer visit: the Leeds Bior Resource site or to sign up for the PGCert visit: the Exeter University course site.

Maxine Berry

Project Support Manager, Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust Bioresource team

Common pitfalls when applying for registration

It has been over a year since we launched the PSA Accredited Register and over 90 Clinical Research Practitioners have been successful in applying for the register. Time needs to be invested in order to ensure applicants provide the necessary information. You will find several guidance documents on the website to help you with making an application.

In previous newsletters, we have provided 'Top Tips from CRPs when applying for registration, this can be found in the January CRP bulletin.

The most common pitfalls when applying for registration are:

Good Clinical Practice Certificate: Registrants forgot to upload their most recent GCP training certificate, this needs to have been completed within the last 3 years.
Standards of Proficiency (SOP): As part of the entry requirements to join the register, registrants must refer to the SOP within their application, the most common pitfall within registration is when registrants don't include any reference to the SOP.
Overseas Qualification: Registrants must provide an ENIC certificate of comparability with UK Standards if their degree qualification was awarded overseas.
Change of name certificate: When applying to the register, if a registrant completed their degree prior to changing their name, they are required to upload a change of name certificate within their application.

We hope identifying these common pitfalls has helped you with completing your registration application, if you have any questions, please don't hesitate to get in touch: crpadmin@ahcs.ac.uk

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