We need your help!

Volunteers needed for focus groups

We are planning on holding focus groups in October, November and December 2021 to gain feedback upon your experience with the Clinical Research Practitioner Directory and the Register. We want to find out if you have encountered any problems with completing your application and your overall experience with constructing the applications.

Please let us know so we can provide the help and support for other applicants who may be in a similar situation to yourselves. These focus groups will last for an hour and are designed for you to drop in and provide feedback, you don’t have to come for the whole hour. 

Please email: crpadmin@ahcs.ac.uk if you would like to come along to a focus group session.  

Join the CRP community space on NIHR Learn!  

Have you joined the CRP community on NIHR Learn yet? This is your space to connect and share updates, experiences or advice with your fellow CRPs.  It is open to everyone on the CRP Directory and register and it is a fantastic way to collaborate with others within your profession.  CRPs are starting to share their experience of making an application to the CRP Register.  

You can access the community via NIHR Learn  Sign up using an NIHR, NHS or academic email address if you do not already have an account.  

Those of you receiving this bulletin are on the CRP Directory (which is a prerequisite for accessing the CRP community space).

The enrollment key is: NIHRCRP2021

Please do not share the enrollment key with other colleagues as we wish to keep this as a space for CRPs.

The forum sits within the Frontline Research Engagement and Collaboration Community where you can also access a recording of the first NHS Engagement online webinar about the ministerial paper “Saving and Improving Lives: The Future of UK Clinical Research Delivery”. You will also find the updated NHS Engagement Toolkit a guide to help you further embed research activity in organisations. 
 

NHS Workforce Wellbeing tool

We appreciate the last 18 months have been challenging so we wanted to highlight a wellbeing tool you may find useful.  The NHS Wellbeing platform is open to all NHS Staff and can help you manage your own health and wellbeing. You can gain support via telephone (7am – 11pm) or via text message (24 hours a day) to help you with any challenges that may come your way.

Within the tool, NHS staff can join groups in which they can connect with others to give support and create a safe space to share concerns with fellow colleagues. 

There are guides that you can work through to develop your own skills with topics such as ‘leadership in systems’ and ‘supporting others in difficult times’. These courses can be worked at your own pace.

To access the well-being tool, please visit: https://people.nhs.uk/, from there, you can create your own account and access resources.

New CRP Administrator

Milly Brittain joined the Academy for Healthcare Science in July as a Project Administrator. She will be looking after the CRP Directory and Register thus, will be your point of call for any queries that you may have in regard to both the directory and register. 

Milly’s previous roles have been in customer advice and Health Education England. She is keen to learn and grow the Clinical Research Practitioner Directory and Register. 

Email address: crpadmin@ahcs.ac.uk   Phone number: 07368 403528 

GDPR

On 25 May 2018, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into force, reflecting the importance of data protection in an increasingly digital world. It is important for the Academy for Healthcare Science (AHCS) that the personal information of registrants, our partners, our customers and our own staff is handled in accordance with GDPR.

As the regulator for Healthcare Science Practitioners, the Academy needs to ensure the information it holds about its registrants is accurate and up to date, not just at annual registration renewal but when anything changes.

Under UK GDPR, we are unable to keep your data unnecessarily, therefore we will be sending out reminder emails to applicants who haven’t logged into their portal after a period of time. This will be an automatic email sent on behalf of the Clinical Research Practitioner admin team.

The automatic emails will be sent after:

• 6 months of no activity: First reminder email to log back into your portal account.
• 7 months after no activity: Final reminder email to log back into your portal account, after another 30 days your account will be removed.
• 8 months after no activity: A final email to let you know that your account will be deleted due to no activity within the last 8 months.

AHCS Accredited Register

Once you have completed an application for the CRP Register and this has gone through administration checks and been approved, you will be on the CRP register! 

Please tell your service users, work colleagues and employer that you have been accepted as a Clinical Research Practitioner on the Academy for Healthcare Science Accredited Register. You can explain how being on the register demonstrates you have met the required standards of professional competence, practice and conduct in your area of Clinical Research Practitioners.

Plus, you can display the AHCS registration mark on your email signatures and other correspondence, please see below how you complete these actions. The mark incorporates the Professional Standards Authority (PSA) Accredited Register Quality Mark which confirms our commitment to public protection and high professional standards.

Email signatures

Once your application for the Register has been approved, you will receive a certification through your portal account.  The certificate will appear in between the ‘monitoring information’ and ‘complete application’ section of your portal account, in a section called ‘certificate’.

You will be able to find your email signature in an email we have sent you, the subject of the email is ‘Application Approved’.  Within the email, there will be a link to the Academy’s website in which you can enter the password supplied via the email link to access your email signature. You can then download the signature and display this within any email correspondence. 

This will show fellow colleagues and anyone who you email that you are a member of the CRP Register and have been recognized as a Clinical Research Practitioner. 

This showcases your professional identity within your clinical role and may encourage other CRP’s to get involved with the Directory and Register. 

September issue of NIHR Learn Insights (CPD Resource) is now live

NIHR Learn Insights for September is now available. In this instalment Janice Paterson, Workforce Strategy Lead, Clinical Research Network, National Coordinating Centre, explores how complementary professional identities that are well understood can both enhance team performance and encourage investment in new roles and career pathways.

We will also provide a spotlight on a programme of learning taking place in Yorkshire and the Humber, which has been designed to address local needs and enhance the learning of our Clinical Research Delivery workforce.

Please note that from September onwards, NIHR Learn Insights will be released every other month. The next instalment will be available at the end of November.

Please share with your networks/teams as appropriate. Contact nihrlearncommunities@nihr.ac.uk  for more information.