Background

£84 million funding in 2006 built on an earlier investment in patient-oriented research.

In 1997 the Wellcome Trust, in collaboration with the English and Scottish Executive Health Departments, launched an initiative to strengthen clinical research in the UK by funding the construction costs of five new Wellcome Trust Clinical Research Facilities.

Five facilities were originally set up in Birmingham, Cambridge, Edinburgh, Manchester and Southampton.

The Facilities provide a purpose-built environment for patient-oriented research, where clinical researchers have access to cutting-edge clinical facilities, human resources and patients. They help to encourage collaborations between basic and clinical scientists helping to ensure that advances in biomedical research feed through into improvements in healthcare.

By July 2006, the facilities were found to be so successful (see success stories), a consortium of research funders led by the Wellcome Trust announced further funding of £84 million to develop and strengthen the facilities. Under the umbrella of the UK Clinical Research Collaboration (UKCRC), this group of funders brought together the major health-related charities, the Government funding bodies and health departments.

This support for experimental medicine was identified as being key to addressing national deficits in clinical research capacity. See the UKCRC website for further information.

The new funding is being used to develop and strengthen Clinical Research Facilities around the UK: Belfast, Birmingham, Cambridge, Edinburgh, The Institute of Cancer Research, Imperial College London, King's College London, Manchester, Newcastle, Oxford and University College London.

Further to this, another facility jointly funded by the Wellcome Trust and the Health Research Board Ireland will be established in Dublin.