Research

Shingles is known to be painful. But did you know that about one in five people who get shingles are left with long-term nerve pain?

​A university of Bristol research study is looking at whether a low dose of a safe and widely used 'nerve' painkiller (amitriptyline) for 3 months can help prevent this. Please talk to our research team at Pioneer (Rob or Dr Cary) if you have developed a shingles rash in the last 6 days and would like to consider this study.

Did you know you can self refer for this study?

Do you have a child 3 months to 2 years old who has eczema? Would you like to improve the treatment of eczema? If so, the TIGER study needs you!

We want to find out whether making changes to the diet of children with eczema, based on the results of food allergy tests, improves eczema control.

If you are interested in taking part or would like to find out more, please contact the study team using the details below:

Telephone: 0117 4553039
Email: tiger-study@bristol.ac.uk
Website: www.bristol.ac.uk/eczema-allergy-study

Did you know? You can self-refer to the below study!

Did you know? You can self-refer to the below study!

This study is about chest infections and worsening of asthma, COPD and heart failure. We want to understand: (a) what impact these illnesses have on patients and the NHS; (b) how many of these illnesses could be prevented by vaccination (e.g. with COVID vaccines and other vaccines that are being developed); and (c) what groups of patients might benefit most from vaccination. For patients who choose to take part, we will collect information (data) from their GP records about them and their illness; collect samples from their nose, throat, saliva and urine; and ask them to complete a diary about their symptoms and wellbeing. We will send participants “Love to Shop” vouchers to reimburse them for their time. Patients who are eligible to take part will be contacted by phone and, wherever possible, the study team will ask their permission to use their data.

Patients can choose to opt out – if they do, we will collect a small amount of non-identifiable data from their record (e.g. age, gender, qualifying condition, reason for opting out) so that we can compare them to patients who choose to take part. Sometimes, despite our efforts, we will be unable to contact the patient. To get a more complete picture of the number of chest infections, we would still like to include their information even without consent. We hold specific approval from the Health Research Authority’s Confidentiality Advisory Group for this. We are very careful to keep data confidential. The data will be anonymised - there will be no way of identifying the patient from the data. This study is led by researchers at the University of Bristol and is funded by Pfizer. For more information, please see the study website or contact the research team by email (bnssg.avoncapgp.pmg@nhs.net) or phone (0117 958 1405).

Pioneer has recruited an amazing 459 patients to this important study this year. 

AvonCAP GP2 is supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), which funds and supports research in the NHS as well as public health and social care research.

Part of the role of the NIHR is to improve research, so that people like you, who take part, have the best experience possible. We would value your feedback through this survey. Taking part in the survey is voluntary, you do not have to fill in this form. It generally takes up to five minutes to complete. Your answers will be used anonymously to help improve research. If you do complete the survey, please remember to add the name of the GP practice, where you took part in the research.

Please scan the QR code to be taken to PRES survey or click here to complete.

Join Dementia Research is a service which allows anyone, with or without dementia, to register their interest in national dementia research. It helps people with dementia, their carers, or anyone interested in dementia research to be matched to studies. Signing up could make a real difference to you and others.

Please see the information leaflet for more information about this important service.

Information in patient records is important for medical research to develop new treatments and test the safety of medicines. At Pioneer we support National medical research by sending some information anonymously from patient records to CPRD.

CPRD is a government organisation that provides anonymised patient data for research to improve patient and public health. You cannot be identified from the information sent to CPRD.

If you do not want anonymised information from your patient record to be used in research you can opt out by speaking to our practice manager or Dr Cary who leads research at the practice. For more information about how anonymised data is used please visit: www.cprd.com/public