What is the PRIDES Hub?
Coordinating Function
The PRIDES Initiative aims to standardise the Health Informatics development and sharing processes currently undertaken by LCRN staff, GP practices and study teams essential for complex studies delivered in primary care settings. The PRIDES Hub (hosted by CRN West Midlands and CRN South West Peninsula), aims to build on the successes of the IT Solutions Pilot Initiative, moving it into a second phase aimed at supporting the integration of the Initiative into CRNCC and LCRN business-as-usual processes as well as complementing other NIHR digital continuous improvement activities (such as the CRN PIC Project and Find, Recruit and Follow-Up Service).
The priority areas of Hub activity are to develop:
A business-as-usual (BAU) delivery model
High profile primary study support
LCRN workforce capacity building (workforce development)
External and internal communications
EC&E activities
Research codes and text messaging
Stakeholder engagement (e.g. GP system suppliers, NHSX)
Network readiness for commercial offers
The Hub will work with the RDMs in each LCRN to identify three groups of people: a) LCRN staff who already have IT skills that could be applied to PRIDES work, b) GPs or GP practice staff who are skilled in this area and are research-active, and c) staff who would be interested in developing those skills in order to support research activity.
These activities would enable them to start delivering work in each of the four work streams described in the Hub Operational Manual, by collaborating with staff in the LCRNs, determining learning and development needs, providing immediate support for LCRNs in which there is a skills gap, facilitating development of training and learning materials and the communication routes needed to make them widely visible and accessible, and providing a central development, quality assurance and test site identification service for the CRN.
Although precise details are yet to be confirmed, it has been pointed out that Industry sponsors could be charged a fee for the service which could subsidise the work carried out for non-commercial studies.
CRNCC Support
The Coordinating Centre will support the PRIDES Hub and LCRNs by:
Hosting the open access national PRIDES website and supporting content development for this LCRN Toolkit
Supporting the maintenance of the national websites up to date to reflect all studies that have an Health Informatics for sharing
Ensuring the national websites have a list of contacts/generic email contacts for each LCRN in order to allow signposting of any queries
Holding a private contact list for the PRIDES teams in each LCRN for internal dialogue
Gathering feedback and supporting continuous improvement of the PRIDES Service with help from LCRN GP Sites and Study Teams