Request New Records in RTS

RTS has an automated data feed from NHS Digital's ODS service: every morning RTS calls the ODS API and downloads all new and updated records.  This means that all NHS organisations and sites (as well as schools in England, ISHPs and more) should already be in RTS.

All other organisations and sites are added at the request of users.  This includes charities and companies inside and outside of the UK, as well as universities and other types of organisations from outside of the UK.

In order to request a new organisation or site record to be added to RTS, users outside of NIHR RDN* must email rts.support@nihr.ac.uk with the following information:

• Name of the Organisation or Site

• Address, including postcode and country

• Website, if there is one

• Internal reference number (to help the requester resolve the request on their end)

• Whether any roles are needed (Funder, Sponsor, CRO, etc)

If a large number of records are required at once, requesters can download a template here to submit requests for multiple records at once.

*Requests from inside NIHR RDN should continue to follow existing SOPs and use the Google Forms.

When a request is received for a new organisation or site record in RTS, the RTS Data Management team will review and action the request.  Once the record has been created, the RTS Identifier will be sent to the person who submitted the request.

Reviewing and actioning the request involves:

• Checking whether a record already exists in RTS for that organisation or site

  • • • If there is an existing record, the RTS Identifier and name will be sent to the requester

• If there is no existing record in RTS yet, the RTS Data Management team will search official registers for information about the organisation

  • • • Official registers include Companies House, the Charities Commission, UK Register of Learning Providers, business registers in the country where the organisation is located, GRID (Global Research Identifier Database) or any other publicly available register containing organisation information

      • If there is no official registration for the organisation (for example, many countries do not register charities) then the RTS Data Management team will collect as much information as possible about the organisation and create an RTS Identifier that reflects the fact that no official identifier was found

• Once the RTS Data Management team has collected the required information, a new record with a unique identifier will be created

• The RTS Data Management team will reply to the requester with the RTS Identifier and name of the organisation, along with any internal reference numbers included in the request.