Welcome to our latest update on our work to build better research services and create the streamlined research environment needed to make the UK Europe’s leading life-sciences economy by 2030.

In this issue, we’re sharing an update on our timeline for development of the new digital service, plan and manage health and care research.

A key part of this work is listening to and learning from our users. That’s why we’re also highlighting opportunities for you to get involved in user research and help shape the services we’re designing.

Your insight and experience are vital. By working together, we can build services that are simpler, more joined up, and truly make it easier to do research people can trust.

Thank you to everyone who has already contributed, and to those who are considering getting involved. 

Matt Westmore
Chief Executive, Health Research Authority

Updated timeline for plan and manage health and care research

Plan and manage health and care research is our new UK-wide digital service that will allow users to plan, approve, manage and complete health and care research in one place. Over time, it will replace older systems, including IRAS and HARP.

Find out what's changing, when new study types will be supported, and what the phased roll-out means for you.

We share the very latest progress with our new services in our interactive quarterly show and tell sessions. Our latest programme show and tell focused on our updated plans and what this means for you.

We'll share details of future sessions in this newsletter.

Take part in office-based user research

We’re looking for people who work in an office (full time or hybrid) and submit research project applications or modifications using our current services to take part. If that’s you, and you’d be happy for a researcher to shadow you for part of a working day, please get in touch and we’ll share more details. 

Help us make our services work for everyone

We’re always looking for people involved in research to help us with user testing to improve our services for everyone. We’d particularly value people with accessibility needs who are able to volunteer.