Case study: Kelly Fricker: working as GP practice research nurse

Listen to a podcast with Kelly on the NIHR SoundCloud page.

What does your role at the practice involve?

The role I have here is the lead research nurse and I’ve been doing this for nearly two years now. My role consists of anything trial related, from recruiting patients to maintaining the site files and anything admin. I love seeing the patients and talking to them about the research that we’re doing and how they can help.

What types of research studies do you have at your practice?

It’s quite varied, there’s a mixture of academic and commercial studies. There’s lots of different types, lots of different conditions; COPD, mental health, arthritis, just to name a few.

How does your practice organise and carry out research?

At my practice, there are two GPs and two nurses. We support each other very well, we work together and hold regular meetings. Our practice is incredibly experienced with research, we’ve been doing it here now for approximately six years.

How do you see yourself in the future?

Research is changing all the time, so it would be great to still be in the same job as I’m doing now in five to 10 years time and just see where research takes us.