Summary
New clinical study offers from the NIHR, plus launch of toolkit focused on paramedics in general practice.
A study into the use of paramedics in general practice has resulted in an implementation toolkit.
The toolkit will be launched at an event on Thursday, 27 June, at Edgbaston Park Hotel and Conference Centre, Birmingham between 10am and 3pm.
The READY paramedics study was designed to investigate different models of paramedics working in general practice and determine the impact on safety, costs, clinical and patient reported outcomes and experience.
If you’re interested in attending the launch, please register to secure a place.
The latest research offers from the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Clinical Research Network (CRN) Greater Manchester are as follows:
The PETRUSHKA trial is funded by the NIHR and aims to assess a web-based decision support tool (PETRUSHKA tool) which combines the best evidence with patient and clinician’s preferences, to personalise antidepressant treatment in routine practice. Participants will be randomised on a 1:1 basis to the PETRUSHKA tool or to usual care. The trial lasts for 24 weeks (primary endpoint after 8 weeks) for each participant and they will be under the care of Oxford Health NHS Trust during this time.
We are looking for participants aged 18 to 74 years who have a clinical diagnosis of depression and for whom an antidepressant is indicated.
Please signpost patients to the PETRUSHKA trial using this poster or via this link.
The PETRUSHKSA trial has a number of advantages for practices now that patients can easily self-refer to the trial.
The trial team psychiatrist will manage the antidepressant medication for you for the six months of the trial – this should reduce the number of appointments required from the practice over this period of time.
Patients are able to participate in a groundbreaking study looking at whether targeted antidepressant choice improves outcomes over usual GP guideline-based choices, as well as help with and participate in clinical research.
INDIGO Community – The study uses questionnaires to help understand how a patient feels about their quality of life and experiences of care.
Using a digital survey tool, the study hopes to run a project that will help understand more about the lives of patients after treatment for cancer. They plan to see which patient reported outcome measures allow participants to express their quality of life as rated by the participants. The study will also explore how to keep the amount of time and effort needed to complete the questionnaires as low as possible.
The COACH Trial – This study is looking to investigate the efficacy of unilateral cochlear implantation compared to acoustic hearing aids (HAs) in improving speech understanding in adults with severe hearing loss whose audiometric thresholds and/or speech perception scores fall outside current candidacy criteria for cochlear implantation. (Looking for practices in South Manchester)
EARLY-HF – As people age, heart failure becomes increasingly common, and it is a major cause of death and disability in middle-aged and older people. Currently, heart failure is usually diagnosed too late, after people have already developed severe symptoms or need to come to hospital. It is important to identify people with heart failure much earlier in the hope that we can start treatments earlier and prevent progression to more severe disease. The study team have developed a method that provides an indication of a person developing heart failure or becoming unwell with it. It currently includes measurements of heart structure and function made from cardiac MRI scanning, blood levels of a marker of fluid retention and medical history factors.
The DISCOVER ME study – More and more GP practices across GM are taking part in the Discover Me study, offering their patients the opportunity to find out their ancestry as well as contribute to creating a dynamic research resource to help us understand disease susceptibility and severity. More information about what the study team are doing can be found on their website
A full list of all available studies in general practice can be found on the NIHR Primary Care Research Hub.
You can also get in touch with the team by emailing: researchsupport.crngm@nihr.ac.uk
More information about clinical research and the work of NIHR CRN GM can be found on the PCB website.
