{"id":62,"date":"2019-10-22T17:11:12","date_gmt":"2019-10-22T16:11:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/ihspgr\/?p=62"},"modified":"2019-10-22T17:11:13","modified_gmt":"2019-10-22T16:11:13","slug":"from-clinical-practice-to-research-keeping-patients-at-the-centre-of-my-phd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/2019\/10\/22\/from-clinical-practice-to-research-keeping-patients-at-the-centre-of-my-phd\/","title":{"rendered":"From Clinical Practice to Research\u2026 keeping patients at the centre of my PhD"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In September 2018, after a career\nspanning over 7 years in Pharmacy, I took the plunge and began a PhD at\nNewcastle University. Changing career, especially after establishing myself in\na specialist area, was particularly nerve-wracking. Not only was I pushing\nmyself out of my comfort zone, I found myself refreshing on skills that I had\nnot used since my undergraduate degree. Yet alongside this was the excitement\nand anticipation to try something new; I was eager and ready for a new\nchallenge. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The idea of doing a PhD had\nintrigued me from my early university days, but it was not something I considered\nseriously until after I was exposed to research projects within my clinical pharmacist\nrole. I was working across two health sectors within the North East of England,\nproviding care to patients in an acute emergency care hospital and in a GP\nsurgery. I could see the impact that research could have, not only to directly\nbenefit patients but to drive quality improvement in healthcare settings. I\nbegan conducting small independent audits for the GP surgery, reflecting on\nprescribing practices in certain disease states. Over time I built up to a\nlarge qualitative project alongside a team of pharmacy students, pharmacists\nand researchers, where we evaluated the role of WhatsApp as a communication\ntool for an NHS Trust. It was then that I truly caught the \u2018research-bug\u2019 and I\nhave not looked back since. I saw a PhD studentship position advertised in an\narea that I was passionate about so I applied and the rest, as they say, is\nhistory. My research centres on surgical improvement, investigating how digital\ntechnologies can be (better) implemented within surgical pathways to support\npatients in making health behaviour changes before and after their operations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a PhD student, maintaining my\nprofessional identity is extremely important to me and I am passionate about\ncontinuing a clinical role alongside my studies. I still regularly practice as\na pharmacist, keeping in touch with \u2018front-line\u2019 services by working in\nhospital and community pharmacy. My previous experience offers me a unique\napproach and insight that I bring to my research. Whilst I am still very much\nat the start of my research career, I cannot wait to see where I end up\nfollowing my PhD. Working with patients and supporting their care was one of\nthe main reasons I became a pharmacist, and hopefully my PhD and future work\nwill continue to contribute to this. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every day was a learning day in\nclinical practice, and every day is a learning day in my research. A recent\nconversation with a supervisor of mine went along the lines of \u201cthis PhD is a\njourney: you learn skills to put into your tool box which will equip you for\nyears to come as a researcher\u201d. Slightly cheesy, but very true. One \u2018tool\u2019 that\nI hope to never lose is my patient-centred focus. No matter where my PhD\nresearch takes me, I am determined to always keep patients at the centre of my\nwork, doing what I can in order to improve their care. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anna Robinson is in receipt of the Dr WE Harker PhD Studentship in\nSurgical Sciences. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

My\nname is Anna Robinson and I am a second year PhD student. My qualitative\nresearch is focused around Surgical Improvement, specifically how we can\n(better) use digital technologies to support health behaviour changes in\nsurgical patients, before and after their operations. Outside of my research, I\nwork as a Specialist Clinical Pharmacist across Northumberland and I hold\na position on the Health Education England North board for pharmacy\nstudent education. In my spare time I play table tennis and I compete in\nBritish Eventing (dressage, show jumping and cross country) on a horse\ncalled Roo. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Twitter:\n@AnnaRobPharm<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In September 2018, after a career spanning over 7 years in Pharmacy, I took the plunge and began a PhD at Newcastle University. Changing career, especially after establishing myself in a specialist area, was particularly nerve-wracking. Not only was I … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8219,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3,6,5,4],"class_list":["post-62","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorised","tag-clinical-practice","tag-digital-technologies","tag-pharmacy","tag-phd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8219"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62\/revisions\/65"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/NUPHSIpgr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}