Bridging care and research at BPAS

I have been working at British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) for two and a half years. I have a biomedical science degree, and I always knew that I wanted to work within women’s health research. I started working at BPAS in one of the clinics as a Healthcare and Admin Assistant. 

Working clinically as a Healthcare Assistant (HCA) is something I am so passionate about and love. My role as an HCA includes: 

• Setting up / cleaning down the treatment room
• Interoperative scanning
• Cannulation
• Being an excellent tea maker
• Providing emotional support to patients 

Being an HCA in a surgical unit is one of the things I am most proud of - the level of care and support this role provides for our patients is amazing, and I love working so closely with the rest of the team. It is a very rewarding role, and I feel privileged to be able to support our patients in this way.

I applied for a part time role as research administrator within the Centre for Reproductive Research and Communication (CRRC) here at BPAS after working 11 months in the organisation, and I now split my time across both roles. My main driver to work in women’s health research was my own negative experience of being diagnosed with endometriosis. As for many people, the diagnosis was a years-long process which started when I was very young. I wanted to improve the healthcare system from the inside out so others wouldn’t have to go through the same experience.

My roles as Research Administrator includes:

• Data collection / recruitment for projects
• Organising team meetings and taking minutes
• Running social media accounts
• Writing reports
• Supporting the wider CRRC team on their projects and evaluations
• Organising projects with external researchers
• Ensuring the smooth running of the Research Approval Group
• Working with BPAS staff who want to be involved in research

I have learnt so much straddling both roles and believe it is important for both researchers and clinical staff to understand each perspective. 

The most significant perk of working both clinically and within research is that I understand how BPAS works, the patient journey and the patient experience from seeing it firsthand. I also have much more knowledge on the ‘behind the scenes’ of the organisation through my research role. This is valuable as I can really understand what influences patient care, as well as understand the organisational changes that are made which affect staff. Working across these multidisciplinary teams, I also have good relationships with a variety of staff members and stakeholders across BPAS.

Working in both clinic and research also highlights new opportunities for innovation as those working in clinics and hubs know exactly what changes would benefit themselves and the patients, and it gives me a direct line of contact between the two. It also allows me to see the real impact previous research has had for our patients and staff.

From my experience, it became clear that patients and staff alike did not know a lot about research at BPAS, even though it is a strategic pillar. Yet, the clinic I work in was much more in the loop about research and what was going on, which is also true for other clinics research team members work in. This, tied with previous patient feedback, sparked the conversation about creating a new research champion role, something I am now leading on (watch this space!). 

I love working both clinically and within research - I get to see the real impact of change, and I also get to feed clinical voices into rooms where they may not be otherwise. It keeps the patients at the heart of everything I do, and I feel so lucky to be working with two excellent teams whom all care about evidence based, patient centred care.