Northumbria University
Research Fellow in Qualitative Health Research
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Job Description
About the Role
This three-month post will enable you to explore the (social) organisation of self-care for children with neurodisability, understand the (taken for granted) organisation of a large cluster randomized controlled trial, as well as help develop more inclusive recruitment and retention processes and procedures.
We want to work with a great qualitative researcher, who has excellent practical, analytic and conceptual skills. You will be working as part of a lovely, friendly and supportive multi-disciplinary trial team. You will be based in the Implementation and Innovation Research Group (IIR) at Northumbria University, working primarily with Tim Rapley.
Working as part of a multi-disciplinary team, you will support the delivery of qualitative work on the NIHR HTA funded CHESS research project by undertaking research activity, writing up research work for publication, and collaborating with project partners. The ethnographic qualitative work will involve interviews, focus groups, workshops, and observation with clinical, managerial, and research staff, and parents, carers, and children over multiple sites across the UK. Some of the fieldwork will be conducted in person, so at times there will be travel to different parts of the UK; some will also be conducted remotely.
The CHESS study is a clinical trial which seeks to assess how parents and professionals can support young children with neurodisabilities to develop independence in everyday self-care tasks. This is a multi-site randomised controlled trial which will include 40 NHS organisations and will involve 960 children and their families. The outcome evaluation will focus on assessing the effects of the self-care intervention on the child’s self-care independence, self-care involvement in child-caregiver interactions, child-health related quality of life, mental health, and caregiver health and care-related quality of life. There will also be an economic evaluation to establish the cost-effectiveness of the work and a qualitative process evaluation. Initially, the qualitative process evaluation will support the development of recruitment and trial processes, with a particular focus on supporting inclusion and diversity. During the internal pilot phase, we will also seek to develop solutions for any emerging problems. Later in the process, we will seek to identify and develop optimal implementation strategies for embedding and normalising the self-care intervention beyond the end of the study.
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This role is fixed-term for 3 months (with potential for extension) and will start in Summer 2026.
This role is part-time 50% - 18.5 hrs per week
Further information is available in the Job Description.
This role is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974, therefore the successful candidate will be subject to a Disclosure and Barring Service check.
About the Team
The trial is led from Newcastle University with Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust as the lead NHS organisation for the trial. Other partners include the University of Aberdeen – the Clinical Trials Unit for the trial; Bangor University and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine supporting the health economics; alongside people from Northumbria University and Newcastle Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust, and the Peninsula Childhood Disability Research Unit at University of Exeter.
You will be embedded in the Implementation and Innovation Research Group (IIR) - a small, friendly, cross-departmental group between Healthcare and Nursing Sciences and Communities and Education at Northumbria University. IIR's work ranges from initiation, scoping, and development of novel ideas for service, therapeutic, and care innovations, to feasibility studies, pilot and full trials with embedded process evaluations, as well as the scaling up and scaling out of evidence-based interventions. IIR works with key health and social care stakeholders to develop innovative, individualised, community-based, and organisational solutions to problems of implementation and knowledge mobilisation through applied research. Through high-quality research, we develop theories, tools, and methodologies as well as interventions to support implementation and knowledge mobilisation in practice.
You will be formally based in the School of Communities and Education at Coach Lane Campus, one of four schools within the Faculty of Health and Wellbeing at Northumbria University.
About You
To be successful in the role you will have:
- Excellent practical, analytic, and conceptual skills in qualitative research.
- Knowledge of contemporary debates in clinical trials is desirable, as is knowledge of debates and challenges relating to neurodisability.
- Ability to travel for the purpose of data collection to various locations in the UK is essential.
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You will hold a PhD, have submitted your PhD, or be about to submit your PhD in the next three months, or have equivalent experience, in a health and/or social science-related discipline.
Further information is available in the person specification.
If you would like an informal discussion about the role, please contact Professor Tim Rapley - tim.rapley@northumbria.ac.uk
To apply for this vacancy, please click 'Apply Now'. Your application should include a covering letter and a CV.
About Us
Join Northumbria University, a research-intensive institution unlocking potential and changing lives locally and globally. Named Times Higher Education's University of the Year in 2022 and Modern University of the Year in 2025, we rank top 25 in the UK for research power. Discover more about us.
With over 37,000 students from more than 140 countries, we offer world-leading research, award-winning partnerships, and an outstanding student experience. We empower our exceptional staff, promoting a positive work-life balance and offering great benefits, including excellent pension schemes, flexible working, generous holiday entitlement, and more.
Our Northumbria Values, co-created by our team, define who we are: Academic Excellence, Innovation, Inclusivity, Collaboration, and Ambition. Our Behaviours shape our work culture: We listen and learn, support one another, respect everyone, trust each other, and are bold.
Based in Newcastle upon Tyne and London, we are an on-campus organisation and offer flexible hours and location where the role allows. We pride ourselves on diversity and inclusivity, holding numerous awards for gender and race equality, disability confidence, and research excellence. We also hold the HR Excellence in Research award for implementing the concordat supporting the career development of Researchers and are members of the Euraxess initiative to deliver information and support to professional researchers. The University has implemented a range of flexible working arrangements, and we are happy to explore candidate requirements as part of the recruitment process.
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