CLAHRC West Manager Richard Hocking updates on progress

The setting up of the National Institute for Health Research Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care West (NIHR CLAHRC West) is progressing well, following our official start date of 1 January 2014.

We have been busy recruiting staff, with several appointments made to the evidence, ethnography and epidemiology themes. Dr Jelena Savovic will lead the team in the evidence theme, with Dr Sabi Redwood and Dr Jeremy Horwood jointly leading the ethnography theme. These and the remaining research themes are progressing well with recruitment, and we will provide further staff recruitment updates in the coming months.

The first meeting of the CLAHRC West board was held in April, combining useful discussions about research collaboration strategies along with the formal agreement for the terms of reference for the board, the research advisory panel and the external advisory group.

The development of new office space for the CLAHRC is on schedule. Office layout plans for the ninth floor in Whitefriars, a city centre location on Lewins Mead, have been agreed and the development project is now out to tender.

We are currently receiving nominations for the research advisory panel that will form part of the process by which CLAHRC West evaluates submitted research proposals and ideas. They will help to ensure that the research undertaken by CLAHRC West is informed by the latest evidence, and reaches high levels of quality and relevance to patient outcomes and public health. We anticipate that the CLAHRC West call for research proposals will be announced soon – in the summer – with a closing date likely to be around mid-September. The call will be open to all in the CLAHRC West area. Selected CLAHRC West research projects will then be initiated from January 2015 onwards.

The CLAHRC West communications team is busy developing our website which we hope will go live in the next few weeks. This will form a key part of our communications strategy and be a main source of information regarding the CLAHRC and its partners. We will issue news items to keep you all informed as this and many of our other developments proceed.