Many patients and their families feel tremendously grateful to Birmingham Children’s Hospital (BCH), not just for saving their child’s life or treating their illness, but for the great patient care given during their stay. There are many ways to give back, and one of these ways is by taking part in research. Since brain tumours in children are rare, it’s often hard to get enough patients to volunteer for studies. Here are ways to get involved with our work whether you are a member of a public or researcher.
Patients and Public
The National Health Service (NHS to most of us!) is always trying to give the public the best service and care possible. To do this, they need patients and their family members to volunteer their time to help with research. This is called Patient and Public Involvement (PPI). PPI is not just about being a participant in research – PPI volunteers can help design, develop, evaluate research and even carry out the research and analysis! We need you!
By getting patients involved in research right from the start, the NHS hopes to improve the quality of research in a number of ways, such as:
- providing different perspectives for the study (especially patient views);
- making the study more sensitive to participants (and so aiding recruitment); and
- ensuring the relevance of research to the public.
The CBTRT is currently re-invigorating its patient involvement across a range of projects and has recently held face to face and online events. We are also seeking individuals to get involved in the study management groups.
Please contact us if you would like to get involved at [email protected]
Fundraising
Our research is funded from a range of local, national and international sources. If you would like to help support our research there are a number of ways you can help.
- The University of Birmingham Development and Alumni Relations Office (DARO) coordinates charitable and philanthropic donations to the University of Birmingham and is always happy to discuss fundraising opportunities.
- Birmingham Children’s Hospital Charity – If you would like any funds to go directly to the Neuro-Oncology Research team when making a donation or fundraising please highlight that donations should go to the 33-3-447 Neuro-Oncology Research fund in the comments section.
Others
Both of these charities were set up by patients and families from Birmingham Children’s Hospital and support research within the team
Larger National Charities
- UK Children’s Cancer and Leukaemia Group
- Little Princess Trust
- Brain Tumour Charity
- Children with Cancer UK
Researchers
If you are interested in becoming involved in this project please contact: [email protected]