Marie Curie Hospice West Midlands signs research partnership with University of Birmingham

The Marie Curie Hospice, West Midlands has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the University of Birmingham to advance both parties’ research in the field of palliative care.

The signing provides a structured framework for the hospice and the university to enter a cooperative relationship to promote teaching, research and other collaborative activity. At the partnership signing, representatives from each organisation met to formalise the direction and areas of research in the first official steering group meeting held under the new memorandum.

Research Lead at the Marie Curie Hospice, West Midlands, Kathy Armour said:

“We see the memorandum as being of mutual benefit. It will help us to identify strategic themes for research and will form a firm foundation for future work and will help to put us in a position to attract larger scale research studies.

“We have a portfolio of 75 projects and proposals, and we have recruited over 200 people to take part in studies. There’s a real appetite to do research that didn’t exist before. We’ve gone from being research reactive to research active.

“Our aim is to become a centre of excellence for palliative care research. The memorandum is a big step towards achieving it.”

The memorandum follows the development of a number of research studies involving both the university and the hospice, with joint work underway, or in development, with the schools of health and population sciences, pharmacy and psychology.

Current joint work includes research into:

• whether the relatives and carers of people with breast, bowel and lung cancer would be receptive to help with changing their lifestyles to improve their health
• male experiences of caring for a partner who is receiving palliative care
• the wider benefits of end of life care for economic evaluation
• costs and effectiveness of UK palliative care day services
• blame and stigma in advanced lung cancer and the implications for health promotion

Three academics from the University of Birmingham are members of the hospice’s Research Steering Group which sets the hospice’s research direction and helps develop a research-based culture.

Senior Lecturer in Nursing at the University of Birmingham, Dr Alistair Hewison said:
 
“We already have an excellent working relationship, and are collaborating on a number of joint projects in this important field.  We now want to build on this foundation and develop a programme of research and teaching that capitalises on the range of expertise at the University and the Hospice, and have a direct impact on practice. We look forward to continuing to work with our colleagues at the Hospice to take our work forward together ”

The Memorandum of Understanding between Marie Curie and the University of Birmingham cements a relationship that has been built over the last four years. It signals the commitment of both organisations to further develop their end of life and palliative care research, and teaching activities, in a spirit of partnership focussed on improving the care of people with life limiting conditions, their families, and the institutions that fund and deliver end of life care.

www.mariecurie.org.uk/research

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