In the UK, over 1.4 million participants took part in health and care research in 2021/22. These people make health and care breakthroughs possible. They help us discover new and better ways to cure and care.
Now it’s your chance to get involved.
The Be Part of Research Volunteer Service is being launched to make it easier for people to take part in a wide range of studies. You may be able to take part from home, at your GP practice or at a local hospital, both in person and virtually.
This service allows you to create an account so you can be contacted about opportunities and research studies which you may have an interest in. Lots of studies also need healthy volunteers too, so you can sign up even if you don't have a diagnosis of a disease or condition. We will only contact you about approved studies and direct you to more information so you can decide if you wish to take part.
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Subscribe to our newsletter to receive all our latest news and opportunities to take part in research from around the UK.
Help shape the service
This service has been launched in a ‘private beta’ phase. At this stage, it is available to a limited number of people. We are asking for people’s views via a feedback link within the service, to help make ongoing improvements to the service.
After further assessment, we plan that the service will be more widely available and promoted to people across the UK.
If you are a researcher, contact bepartofresearch@nihr.ac.uk to see how you can get your study onto the service.
Questions and Answers
General
By signing up to the service, you will be able to find and take part in research studies matching the health conditions you are interested in, taking place in the locations you select too. You can help support studies across the UK to hit their recruitment target faster, and reach discoveries sooner.
Yes, you remain in control of your personal data and preferences. Once you have registered on the Be Part of Research Volunteer Service, you will be able to manage your account and make changes to your account.
If you change your email during the private beta stage and are therefore unable to log in, you will be prompted to contact the team and we can add the new email address to the system.
You can withdraw from the Volunteer Service at any time by accessing the ‘My account’ page and clicking on the ‘Close your account’ link. There is a button to confirm you want to close your account and clicking this button will officially close your Volunteer Service account.
Private beta means it is not yet launched to the wider public and is available to a limited number of people. During this phase, we will carry out user research to help make ongoing improvements to the service.
Private beta is the first launch of the service to the public and the service will move into public beta once it has been assessed as meeting the standards for new NHS and other publicly-funded digital services.
If you provide consent, our user research team may ask you to discuss the service in more detail with them so we can get your views and feedback.
As volunteers only gave their consent for their data to be held for the NHS COVID-19 Vaccine Research Registry, your data cannot be moved across. To receive study invites for the conditions you are interested in, matching your personal details, you need to sign-up to join the Be Part of Research Volunteer Service.
The Vaccine Research Registry will continue to notify participants in the usual way about opportunities to take part in COVID-19 vaccine studies.
In order for you to make informed choices, those of you who have also expressed an interest in non-COVID-19 studies will receive a regular round-up of research opportunities into wider conditions other than COVID-19 when they open.
No. The Be Part of Research Volunteer Service complements, rather than replaces, the existing study listings on the Be Part of Research site. Using the study search is the most comprehensive way to find studies in your chosen area of interest and location.
Creating a Be Part of Research Volunteer Service account allows the Be Part of Research team to contact you. They will let you know that a study you might be interested in is using the Volunteer Service to recruit participants.
Data
The safety of your personal data is our top priority and we have put in place rigorous systems to protect it. We operate to ISO27001, an international standard on information management, and are committed to ensuring that your information is secure.
The security of Be Part of Research is managed by the NIHR Information Systems Function, on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Care. We have expertise in place to protect against unlawful processing and/or accidental loss of information. Please refer to 'How we store and protect your personal information' within the Privacy Policy for further information.
Only strictly authorised members of the NIHR Be Part of Research team will have access to your data. This will only be used to contact you if a study is relevant to you.
Please provide feedback by clicking on the feedback link in the header of all of the new Volunteer Service pages of the website.
Your feedback will enable us to improve the service and ensure we are meeting the needs of the people using it. We will work to ensure our service is inclusive, enabling as many people as possible to access health and care research opportunities.
You can also provide feedback directly to the Be Part of Research team by emailing: bepartofresearch@nihr.ac.uk
Contact
Please email bepartofresearch@nihr.ac.uk. We operate Monday - Friday and will try to respond as soon as possible.
Once you sign up to the Be Part of Research Volunteer Service, members of the Be Part of Research team will be able to contact you. You may be sent a link to the study website or provided with contact details for the research study team.
We won’t pass your details onto researchers directly - you will get the chance to respond. Even when you are given details about a study, you have no obligation to take part or respond. If you give consent, we may also ask for your feedback on the system.
This will depend on the areas of research you have selected and the number of studies using the service. So it may be weeks or months before you hear about studies in your specific area of interest.
You can find details of other studies and how to take part on the Be Part of Research website or by signing up to the monthly Be Part of Research newsletter.
