NIHR

The NIHR is funded by the Department of Health and Social Care to improve the health and wealth of the nation through research. Working in partnership with the NHS, universities, local government, other research funders, patients and the public - we fund, enable and deliver world-leading health and social care research that improves people's health and wellbeing and promotes economic growth.

NIHR Research Delivery Network

The NIHR Research Delivery Network (RDN), fully established from October 2024, will support the country’s world-class research system to deliver high quality research that enables the best care for our population. The RDN will operate as one organisation across England, through a network of 12 Regional Research Delivery Networks (RRDNs) and a central Coordinating Centre (RDNCC).

CRN Study Support Service transformation programme (Springboard)

The ‘Springboard’ transformation programme is transforming our Study Support Service. The programme bridges and moves us from our current ways of working to our new ways of working as the RDN; supporting studies to be effectively delivered across the system and building strategic capacity and capability in a different way.

NIHR also hosts the following services to encourage people to take part in research:

Be Part of Research

Be Part of Research helps people to find and take part in a wide range of health and social care research, taking place at locations across the UK. Our service is designed to make it easier for researchers and potential study participants to find each other.

Our Be Part of Research volunteer registry helps accelerate study recruitment. It’s the first UK-wide registry for all health and care specialties - providing researchers with free and easy access to research-engaged volunteers.

We can:

• help you recruit more quickly and effectively from a growing database of volunteers
• identify volunteers through a wide range of demographic data
• work with a wide range of research studies from surveys to clinical trials - taking place at local hospitals, GP surgeries, community settings or from home.

Find out more at: www.bepartofresearch.nihr.ac.uk/researchers

Join Dementia Research

Join Dementia Research is a place to register a participant's interest in taking part in vital dementia research. It’s an online and telephone service that matches patients and the public with dementia research studies uploaded to the system.

The service is run by the National Institute of Health and Care Research (NIHR) in partnership with Alzheimer’s Research UK, Alzheimer’s Society and Alzheimer Scotland and funded by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).

Using the Join Dementia Research platform can help researchers:

• identify research-ready volunteers
• screen and contact volunteers
• run feasibility tests for future studies

The types of studies focusing on dementia have included:

• drug trials
• imaging trials
• biomarker testing
• cognitive tests
• social and psychological interventions eg talking therapy
• physical therapy
• early diagnosis
• carer research.

Find out more at: https://www.joindementiaresearch.nihr.ac.uk/content/researchers