The Pharmaceutical Journal Vol 267 No 7172 p661-662
3 November 2001

This article
Reprint
Photocopy

Society News summary

£40,000 awarded in grants to support practice research projects

The Royal Pharmaceutical Society has announced the grant of four awards totalling £40,000 to support practice research projects by pharmacists.

The £10,000 Galen award, which is funded from a bequest to the Society from the late Rowland Henry Williams, has been granted to Claire Bateson, of the School of Pharmacy, University of London.

The other awards are Sir Hugh Linstead fellowships, which are funded by a grant from the Leverhulme Trade Charities Trust. The total value of these fellowships has been increased this year from £15,000 to £30,000. Two fellowships go to Emma Jones, of the Welsh School of Pharmacy, University of Cardiff, and Charles Morecroft, of the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Manchester. Details of a third and final award are still to be completed and are expected to be announced shortly.

Claire Bateson will use her Galen award to continue her research on improving medicines management at the interface between hospital and community. The study will evaluate the impact of providing information across the health care interface on drug-related problems and the use of primary care services.

Emma Jones's Linstead fellowship will support a project on "Lay management of health and illness: a qualitative approach". The aim is to provide an insight into how men manage their own health and illness episodes, with a view to providing some of the information required to make informed decisions regarding the promotion of community pharmacy as a provider of advice for men on health and illness.

Charles Morecroft will use his fellowship to explore how people construct the concept of appropriateness in the context of prescribed medication for hypertension and its treatment. The research will use "Q-methodology", a technique that provides a foundation for the systematic study of subjectivity and has not been previously tested in a community pharmacy environment.

The award-winning research projects were selected by the Society's practice research awards panel and approved by the Council at its October meeting.

Since 1995, the Society's practice research awards have funded 20 projects across a broad range of topic areas. Examples include Robert Horne's work on the influence of perceived symptoms of illness and medication beliefs and on adherence behaviour in a sample of hypertensive patients, Jo Barnes's work on complementary medicine and the community pharmacy role, and Nicola Gray's work exploring the way young adults use sources of health information.

A call for proposals for the 2002 practice research awards will be issued in January 2002, when the application details will be published in The Pharmaceutical Journal and on the Society's website (www.rpsgb.org.uk).

The practice research division is planning to hold a seminar in March 2002 to showcase some of the research that has been funded through the practice research awards in recent years. Further information on the seminar and on the 2002 awards is available from Zoe Whittington, research manager (tel 020 7572 2276; e-mail zwhittington@rpsgb.org.uk).

Back to Top