Apply for the Healthcare Professional Placement Scheme
Applications are currently open for the Healthcare Professional Placement Scheme. Apply by Tuesday 16 December 2025.
The NIHR Manchester Biomedical Research Centre is offering healthcare professionals the chance to experience what working in research is like through short, flexible up to 12-week placements (or equivalent number of days). Employers will also receive backfill funding of up to £6,000 per participant to release staff for the duration of the placement.
Find out more about the scheme and read insights from previous participants.
Download the Healthcare Professional Placement Scheme advert.
The available projects are:
- Advanced Radiotherapy Theme: Understanding radiographer knowledge around acquisition of quantitative MR imaging: development of a survey
- Living With and Beyond Cancer Theme and Advanced Radiotherapy Theme: Risk of breast cancer in young women receiving radiotherapy to the chest
- Living With and Beyond Cancer Theme and Advanced Radiotherapy Theme: Understanding paediatric cranio-facial growth after head and neck radiotherapy
- Cancer Prevention and Early Detection Theme: Weight loss / weight gain prevention intervention research
- Cancer Precision Medicine Theme and Living With and Beyond Cancer Theme: Measuring Anxiety and Psychological impact in Cancer of Unknown Primary (CUP)
- Respiratory Medicine Theme: Characteristics of COPD Exacerbations (COPE)
- Respiratory Medicine Theme: PULSE-CF: Precision in Understanding and Preventing Exacerbations in Cystic Fibrosis
- Respiratory Medicine Theme: RADicA (Rapid Access Diagnostics for Asthma)
- Integrative Cardiovascular Medicine Theme: Exploring the impact of postnatal antihypertensive regimens on blood pressure control following pre-eclampsia
- Hearing Health Theme: Compassion Fatigue and Burnout Across Audiology Specialisms: A Mixed-Methods Study
- Mental Health Theme and Hearing Health Theme: The association between hearing loss and suicidality in adults with mental health disorders: A systematic review
- Mental Health Theme and Hearing Health Theme: The relationship between hearing loss and auditory hallucinations: A systematic review
- Mental Health Theme: Characterising the relationship between alcohol use and sleep disturbance in psychosis: a systematic review and meta-analysis
- Mental Health Theme: How can digital tools (e.g. health apps, online therapy, telepsychiatry) be made accessible and culturally relevant for ethnically diverse young people with serious mental illness (SMI)? A systematic review
- Rare Conditions Theme and Advanced Phenotyping and Diagnostics Theme: A pilot study exploring genotype-phenotype-epiphenotype relationships
Who can apply?
The scheme is open to healthcare professionals (NHS Agenda for Change Band 8a and below) who have limited or no formal research experience but have a keen interest in research and improving patient outcomes.
Staff must be working in one of the NIHR Manchester BRC partner NHS Trusts: Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust.
Staff groups include:
- Nurses and Midwives.
- Allied Health Professionals including Occupational Therapists, Physiotherapists, Operating Department Practitioners, Orthoptists, Paramedics, Podiatrists, Prosthetists, Orthotists, Radiographers, Dietitians and Speech and Language Therapists.
- Other healthcare professionals including (but not limited to) Pharmacists, Audiologists, Psychologists, Healthcare Science professionals.
Applicants will require approval from their line manager to apply for the scheme and successful candidates must be able to begin their allocated placement no later than August 2026.
Applicants must not be part of a similar scheme or studying for a PhD or other research-based course.
How do I apply?
If you are interested in applying, please complete the forms below and submit them to lisa.murray@mft.nhs.uk by Tuesday 16 December 2025 at 12.00pm.
You should choose a project from the list above that you are most interested in. The project topics are aligned to the Manchester BRC research Themes with the allocation of a practice and/or academic supervisor.
You can propose your own project idea and academic supervisor (if you have one) for us to review and consider. Please note that your proposal must align with one of the Manchester BRC Themes to support this.
The employer approval form needs to be completed by your authorising manager and submitted with your application form. Without signed consent, via this form, your application will not be considered.
Applications are encouraged from all sections of the community regardless of age, sex, gender, gender expression, ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation and transgender status, and all awards are made on merit.
Important dates
- Information session: Wednesday 12 November 2025 at 10.00am
- Application deadline: Tuesday 16 December 2025 at 12.00pm
- Project supervisors to meet with candidates: weeks beginning 5 January and 12 January 2026
- Offers made: January 2026
- Start date: No later than August 2026
Further information
Please get in touch with Lisa Murray, BRC Education and Training Senior Manager at lisa.murray@mft.nhs.uk if you have any general questions.
Alternatively, please come along to the information session on Wednesday 12 November 2025 from 10.00am to 10.30am via Microsoft Teams. Join the meeting.
If you have any questions related to a specific project, please contact the supervisor listed on the project form.