BRC PhD: Improving recovery from pneumonia after hospitalisation

BRC PhD: Improving recovery from pneumonia after hospitalisation

Applications are invited from UK students for a three-year PhD studentship funded by the NIHR Nottingham Biomedical Research Centre, School of Medicine.

The PhD project is clinically focused towards improving the recovery of patients who survive an episode of pneumonia.  Pneumonia is a common illness that results in over 100,000 hospital admissions per year in the UK. Following hospital treatment for pneumonia, 55% of patients visit their GP within 30 days of discharge from hospital while 15% are readmitted to hospital within 30 days of discharge. Symptoms from pneumonia commonly persist for over 6 weeks following initial treatment. Despite the high morbidity experienced and described by patients, there is very little research into how to improve patient care during recovery from pneumonia. 

The PhD student will determine the burden of recovering from pneumonia on primary care consultations and hospital readmission episodes in the post-pandemic period compared to the pre-pandemic period. The burden of recovering from other acute respiratory infections (respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and SARS-CoV2 virus) will also be compared. These analyses will be conducted using nationally representative databases; the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD) and Hospital Episodes Statistics (HES). 

The second part of the PhD project will involve piloting an interventional clinical trial at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust. Patients will be randomised to receive either standard of care (which includes a patient information sheet) or standard of care plus a nurse-led phone contact. Objectives: 1) To determine patients’ perspective on a pneumonia information leaflet provided at the time of hospital discharge in accordance with the NICE Pneumonia guideline (standard of care), and what additional information could be included. 2) To determine if nurse-led telephone support in the week following hospital discharge, in addition to standard of care, can reduce primary care consultations during recovery from pneumonia, compared to standard of  care alone; 3) To measure Quality of Life in a representative cohort of patients post-discharge – this will inform future trial design. The pilot will provide data on trial acceptability, eligibility, recruitment, retention, follow on and other measures relevant to design of a clinical trial.  Alongside the qualitative study, we would aim to establish an Acute Respiratory Infections patient and public interest group as a national resource to support other studies in this field. 

Who is this PhD suitable for? This PhD is suitable for a hard-working researcher with an interest in respiratory infections. Essential skills: A BSc degree or equivalent ideally in a health related field, excellent computer literacy, good inter-personal communications skills. Desirable skills: Master in Epidemiology or Public Health with experience in medical statistical analyses, strong understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of scientific research and / or experience of qualitative research.   Expertise will be gained in how to use large datasets (‘big data’) to address clinically relevant questions and how to design and conduct a clinical trial. 

Following completion of the PhD, the researcher should be in a position to design, set up and conduct independent research. This project builds on previous work completed in Nottingham in the field of pneumonia recovery. 

How will the PhD outputs impact patient care? The PhD would be expected to lead to a clinical trial; if found to be beneficial, it should be possible to introduce the trial intervention into the NHS with minimal new resources leading to potential benefits to patient care (quality of life), healthcare resource utilisation (post-discharge consultations and readmissions) and antimicrobial stewardship (reduced antibiotic use).

The PhD studentship will commence on April 1st

Core supervisors to the PhD will be Professor Tricia McKeever1, Professor Charlotte Bolton2, Professor Wei Shen Lim3 and Dr Manpreet Bains4

1 Epidemiology and Medical Statistics,2 Respiratory Medicine, 3 Respiratory Infections 4Qualitative Research

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