We recognise at this time of responsiveness to COVID-19 there are concerns regarding the practicalities of pausing research programs to return to clinical duties.
The Trust is acutely aware of the importance of research informing clinical practice at a time like this and there have inevitably been questions related to how we might support colleagues who are undertaking research fellowships at various stages.
Statements from NIHR and the Royal College of Physicians regarding the pausing of research programs can be found at:
https://www.rcplondon.ac.uk/news/clinical-academics-and-covid-19
In light of the emerging advice, the Trust is recommending the following guidance:
- When current programmes are pausedto enable a return to frontline practice, individuals are asked to discuss and manage this within their own clinical departments, through line managers and academic supervisors where appropriate. The relevant university guidelines should be followed in requesting any pause to a specific academic programme.
- Those holding fellowships who are medics have all been contacted by their major funders to offer their support. NIHR, UKRI and Wellcome Trust are all supportive and should meet excess incurred costs. Work is ongoing with other funders at the present time to determine how any excess incurred costs will be covered.
- Careful monitoring will be required to enable the accurate capture of time off-programme and clinical hours worked. For clinical staff employed on a substantive Newcastle University contract with Trust Honorary Status, please fill in the form https://secureforms.ncl.ac.uk/view.php?id=97877 which can be accessed through your Newcastle University e-mail account. For clinical staff employed on a substantive Trust contract, please fill in the proforma which can be found at https://newcastlejro.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/COVIDResearchProgrammePauseProforma.docx This is to ensure we can support, oversee and inform a timely and straightforward process of restarting in the future.
In the event of a programme extension incurring additional academic costs, this will need to be negotiated with the academic institution and your funder on a case by case basis at the time of restart. We will support this.