Research Involvement Opportunities

Identifying people at risk of developing psoriatic arthritis

• Are you living with psoriasis and want to participate in research?
• Aged 18 or over and living in Europe
• Not diagnosed with psoriatic arthritis

Researchers invite you to share your experiences.

Up to one third of people living with psoriasis will develop a related arthritis causing inflammation in the joints and tendons.

HPOS is a study of people living with psoriasis. Led by patient research partners and a research team at the University of Oxford and Trinity College Dublin, it is part of a large research project investigating psoriasis arthritis across Europe. Researchers want to identify which people living with psoriasis will develop arthritis. With your help, they can advance medicine and improve long-term quality of life for people living with psoriasis.

The study will run over 5 years and participants will be treated with full confidentiality. You will be asked to complete a small number of online questionnaires. You can choose which parts of the study to be a part of and can change your mind about participating, and your preferences, at any time.

You can find more information on the study website here.

If you have any further questions, contact hpos@ndorms.ox.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Remote peer mentorship in osteoarthritis (RaMIgO) study

Many people living with hip or knee osteoarthritis have problems with pain, mobility or loneliness. If you too are living with hip or knee osteoarthritis, you could support others to manage their condition better by becoming a peer mentor.

University of Leeds researchers are carrying out a study to explore whether volunteer peer mentors can help other people living with hip or knee osteoarthritis (OA) by providing weekly remote (online or telephone) support sessions.

The researchers would love to hear from you if you want to become a peer mentor and if:

• you are living with osteoarthritis of the hip or knee
• you feel that you are disadvantaged because of your finances, education or social circumstances
• you can spare 1-2 hours a week for 6 weeks to support others.

Volunteers will receive 2-day training that will cover: OA self-management; training in mentoring skills; £20 thank you payment for each support session you deliver; additional support with WiFi and other enabling costs.

If you are interested in getting involved, please contact Liz Lavender (Study-Coordinator) or Amrit Daffu-O’Reilly by email at mskprism@leeds.ac.uk or phone 07745 210126.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Patient experiences of accessing First Contact Practice Physiotherapists in the UK

Researchers at the NIHR, University of Leeds, want to investigate the views and experiences of people who have accessed First Contact Practice Physiotherapy (FCPP) at their GP surgery. FCPP is a relatively new initiative to give patients with musculoskeletal (MSK) problems quick access to expert MSK physiotherapists in their GP surgery.  This frees up time for GPs to see other patients, and patients get quicker access to an expert in their problem.

Because this type of practice is relatively new, there is little research about it.  The researchers are interested in making access to FCPPs as quick and efficient as possible so that patients and the healthcare system get the potential benefits promptly. This will help them to try to improve access to FCPP for all patients.

As part of the study, researchers will conduct a short online interview (over Zoom or Microsoft Teams) asking participants how they accessed FCPP and what they thought about it.

If you would like to participate, please use this link to register your interest or contact Kirsten Lamb at k.l.lamb@leeds.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

The Living with a LTC Study

People who live with long-term conditions (LTCs) often experience emotional difficulties related to their physical health. Researchers at King’s College London have developed a new questionnaire to measure the emotional distress related to living with a LTC. We hope this will eventually help healthcare practitioners better identify people who might need support.

The researchers are looking for people who are:

• 18 years or older
• based in the UK
• have a long-term condition – eg arthritis, diabetes, heart disease, IBS, endometriosis, cancer, Long COVID or other
• have an email address

You can participate in the survey and find a Participant Information Sheet through this link.

Completing the screening survey and questionnaire should take around 20 minutes. One week later, you will be sent a link to complete an additional 5-minute survey. You will also have the opportunity to win 1 of 5 x £100 vouchers.

If you have any questions about the study, please get in touch with the team at LTC-Study@kcl.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

NICE is carrying out a project on the procedure ‘Microstructural scaffold (patch) insertion without autologous cell implantation for repairing symptomatic chondral knee defects’ IP1098/3.

They are looking at how well the procedure is working and if it is safe enough to be used more widely in the NHS in the future.

A chondral defect is a focal area of damage to the cartilage that protects the ends of the bones in the knee joint from friction during movement. This can cause pain, stiffness in the knee, and reduced mobility. With the Microstructural Scaffold (patch) insertion procedure, the damaged cartilage is removed and tiny lesions are made in the bone beneath to stimulate the growth of new cartilage. The affected area is then covered with material that acts as a scaffold for the new cartilage tissue to grow into. The procedure aims to reduce symptoms, preserve joint function, and may reduce or delay the need for a later total knee replacement.

NICE would like to hear from people who have had the procedure and are inviting them to share their individual views and experiences via a feedback questionnaire: https://nice.welcomesyourfeedback.net/IP1098_3  If you have not had this procedure, please do not complete the questionnaire.

The survey should take no more than 10 minutes to complete. The deadline for submitting responses is 16 February 2024. 

For assistance or advice on completing the questionnaire, please email pip@nice.org.uk or call 0161 870 3020.

If you would like to find out more about NICE or the programme, please visit their website.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Supporting chronic pain at work: A needs assessment of employees with chronic pain and employers working at small to medium-sized enterprises

Are you an employee with chronic pain  or an employer working at a company with less than 250 employees?

Then researchers at Glasgow Caledonian University would like to hear from you!

Around 43% of people in the UK have chronic pain (pain lasting more than 3 months) which can result in absenteeism and employment issues. Researchers lack the perspective of employees working for small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which is problematic given SMEs constitute 99.8% of all UK Businesses. Researchers at the university are conducting interviews with employees from SMEs who have chronic pain and SME employers to understand their needs and help support people with chronic pain to remain at work.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Aged 18 or over
• In chronic pain for at least three months and currently working for an SME with less than 250 employees
• Working in any capacity (full-time, part-time or zero-hour contracts) for any length of time
• Fluent in English

Some Exclusion Criteria apply, see the Study Information Sheet for full eligibility criteria and for further information about the study.

Participation involves answering a brief questionnaire and a 1-hour online interview.

If you are interested in taking part, please contact Ronald O’Kane at ronald.okane@gcu.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Researchers are seeking participants for a Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) session. They are looking for people with knee osteoarthritis who may require knee surgery, to discuss a potential research project.

The project wants to co-develop a pain education and compassion focused intervention for patients who will undergo knee surgery, with the long-term aim to develop an intervention that will aid better recovery. Planned surgery to replace a knee joint is a routine NHS procedure that is becoming more common in people of working age and this proportion will rise over the next decade. A high proportion of patients experience ongoing problems following orthopaedic surgery and rate themselves as dissatisfied. This is often influenced by psychological factors, for example anxiety. There is evidence to suggest that improvements can be made in how pain is managed following surgery.

We would like your help in understanding your thoughts towards this idea and in helping to shape the research. We will hold a one-hour online focus group to discuss this with our PPI panel.

If you are interested in participating in the PPI session, please contact Lorelle Dismore at Lorelle.dismore@northumbria-healthcare.nhs.uk or telephone 0191 293 4087.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Researchers from the Universities of Manchester, York and Birmingham are inviting patients/carers to take part in a one-hour interview as part of a research project exploring what NHS and private hospitals think and know about activities that help to support and improve high standards of care (often called ‘clinical governance’).

To take part in this study, you or an individual you care for must have received care for the same health issue in both an NHS and private hospital in the last three years (excluding mental health services). This will have included an overnight stay in either or both an NHS and private hospital or may have involved a transfer from a private hospital to an NHS hospital.

Taking part involves participating in a one-to-one online/telephone interview with a researcher at a time that works for you. Interviews usually take up to 1 hour, and you will be paid £25 for your time.

If you are interested and would like to know more, please contact the research project coordinator Ellie at Eleanor.gee@manchester.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

The Relationship Between Perceived Injustice and Chronic Pain: The Role of Sleep Disturbance.

Researchers at Teesside University are looking for participants to take part in an online study.

When an individual experiences long-term pain following an injury, some people may believe they have been the victim of unfair treatment. To date, research has demonstrated that strong perceptions of injustice, following an injury or accident, is linked to more severe and long-standing experiences of pain. Additionally, there is often greater resistance to treatment and pain-management interventions.

The primary purpose of this research is to create a conceptual model to develop a greater understanding of how and why perceptions of injustice affect an individual’s experience of pain. Specifically, the model will assess if sleep disturbance plays a role in mediating the relationship between perceived injustice and chronic pain. Researchers will use this information to create a model that can be tested and validated in future research and to develop knowledge that will help to guide clinicians who treat people living with chronic pain.

If you are interested in finding out more about this study prior to taking part, please email Chief Investigator Craig Govan at b1225631@tees.ac.uk.

The online study can be accessed through this link.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Exploring perspectives on prolonged sedentary behaviour and ways to overcome it in a lower limb, osteoarthritic population

Are you aged 18 or over? Do you have lower limb osteoarthritis?

Researchers at York St John University are conducting a study to gather the views of people diagnosed with lower limb osteoarthritis, to understand what they need, and how to reduce time spent sitting. We aim to create an intervention that may provide positive long-term change to habitual activity and promote cardiovascular health.

Participants in the study will be invited to complete an informal one-to-one interview (online, by telephone, or possibly face-to-face) with researcher Zoe Dawson to gain your perspectives on sitting and ways to overcome prolonged time spent in sedentary behaviour. You will then be invited to attend a follow-up focus group, either online or within the local West Yorkshire community, to discuss these themes with others in more detail. Completion of the focus groups is entirely optional. Interviews and focus groups are expected to last approximately an hour to an hour and a half. Both the interviews and focus groups will be audio recorded for analysis purposes.

If you are interested in taking part in this study, or would like to find out more about it, please email Zoe Dawson at z.dawson@yorksj.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Research Study: how physical activity impacts on pain in people with chronic musculoskeletal disorders

We are a research team from the Faculty of Rehabilitation Sciences at Hasselt University in Belgium. We are investigating the relationship between the intensity of daily physical activity and chronic musculoskeletal pain and the facilitators and barriers that patients experience when taking part in physical activity and how this impacts motivation.

We are looking to recruit people aged 18 or over with one of the following chronic musculoskeletal disorders: chronic lower back pain, chronic neck pain, chronic shoulder pain, chronic temporo-mandibular disorder, osteoarthritis, or fibromyalgia.

Participants are invited to fill in an online survey that should take approximately 30 minutes to complete. For further details and to access the survey, please follow the survey link.

 If you have any questions about this research study, please email Doctor Jonas Verbrugghe at jonas.verbrugghe@uhasselt.be.

Your participation in this research project is extremely valuable to us, thank you for your attention.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.

Cardiovascular health and habitual activity study – for those with and without osteoarthritis

Researchers at York St John University are conducting a study comparing health and activity levels in those who have osteoarthritis and those who do not. They are seeking people who meet the following criteria:

• Diagnosis of lower limb osteoarthritis
• Aged 45 and over
• Able to mobilise independently
• Free from hip or knee joint replacement
• Free from other disease

Requirements to participate:

• Participants must be able to make one visit to the York St John Haxby Road campus
• Consent to a series of tests to measure blood pressure, heart rate and blood vessel function
• Participants will be asked to complete a questionnaire on their sedentary activities and to wear two activity monitors for 7 days.

If you are interested or require more information, please contact primary researcher Zoe Dawson at zoe.dawson1@yorksj.ac.uk.

This research opportunity is NOT organised by Arthritis Action and we cannot take responsibility for your involvement.