Physiotherapist Harmeet Kaur Momi works in NCA’s long covid service and has completed an internship with our Centre for Clinical and Care Research. She’s blogged about her experience and what she’s learnt.
Being in the long covid service you read a lot of new evidence and are exposed to reviewing papers as well as signposting patients to enrol in studies. I already had an interest in being involved in research but this time let me be more hands-on in the write up, data collection or reviewing studies directly. This internship seemed the perfect opportunity to meet those learning needs and desires.
I first met with my CCR mentor, Dr Deborah Antcliff who was very supportive and helpful. Debbie linked me with my direct mentor from University of Salford (UoS), Professor Bhuvana Bibleraaj who I met with monthly for the duration of the internship. I quickly got started on writing my project protocol which grew in detail and depth over the first three months. The guidance from Bhuvana and Debbie was great, the write up changes were challenging but it also felt rewarding to see the protocol take shape and develop into a something more coherent and fuller.
Essential skills
During the first two months I also met with various individuals and teams who provided excellent support. This included the NCA audit team, Andy Vail (Statistician), NCA Library and Knowledge Service and Research and Innovation (R&I) Management Team. This combination of support allowed me to successfully develop my service evaluation and gain essential skills and knowledge.
I was able to submit my service evaluation proposal to R&I which was accepted in July 2024. I then adjusted my outcomes and objectives which I found to be quite challenging due to more parties being involved. It was also different to writing a project protocol and then moving onto statistical analysis. Through self-teaching I used the statistical software suite, SPSS to conduct my analysis and successfully completed this at the end of my internship in October 2024.
Balancing act
During the internship, I also began to write an application for a Council for Allied Health Professions Research (CAHPR) grant. This was a tricky balance of writing up my original project, continuing my usual clinical role and meeting the application deadline. I attended an online guidance session to complete the application which was useful.
I also attended several training sessions during the internship which supported my ongoing development. I first attended a writing workshop hosted by NHS R&D NorthWest which was difficult but also insightful and helped me to get to the write up stage post data analysis. The CCR hosted a scoping review training session in collaboration with UoS which was quite helpful toward the CAHPR grant application and considering my future research career journey as well as how pieces of work connect and link onto each other. I also attended an introduction to Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) in Research session hosted by the CCR.
Next steps following the internship include:
- Writing up the service evaluation for publication and to present to relevant teams.
- Creating an abstract and poster for submission to the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy conference and to share across NCA.
- Look into a pre doctoral applications once I have completed current work and the NIHR BRC Pre-Application Support Fund.
Networking with others experienced in research and those in different stages of their research journey has been both insightful and reassuring for what could happen next in my development.