women's health research funding uk

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Improving women’s health and care through research

Published: 08 March 2023

Dr Gail Marzetti, Director of Science, Research and Evidence at the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), discusses the best ways to address the under-representation of women across health and care research.

Last year, DHSC published its first Women’s Health Strategy for England . The strategy sets out a 10-year ambition to boost health outcomes for all women and girls and radically improve the way in which the health and care system engages and listens to them.

Although women in England live longer than men on average, they spend a significantly greater proportion of their lives in ill health and disability .

I am glad to see research and evidence featured throughout the strategy. In particular, I welcome the long-term focus on addressing the lack of research into women’s health conditions; improving the representation of women of all demographics in research; addressing key evidence gaps; and ensuring that data are broken down by sex.

When I was working in humanitarian aid in Mozambique 30 years ago, I attended a UNICEF conference where we discussed the vital importance of disaggregating research findings by sex and it’s frustrating that this continues to be an issue.

The Strategy highlights that NIHR expects to commission a new  Policy Research Unit for Reproductive Health to inform government policy. This is taking a life course approach to reproductive health and is inclusive of groups currently under-represented in research.

I’m proud of this development but I know that more is needed. In particular, it’s important to remember that women’s health needs are not only reproductive. Not enough is known about how conditions that affect both men and women may impact women in different ways.

Since the launch of the strategy, colleagues in DHSC and NIHR have been discussing four priority areas that are vital if we are to realise its ambitions:

• How can we improve the representation of women in research, including clinical trials and disaggregation of results?
• How can we increase the representation of diverse women across NIHR awards and committees?
• How can we ensure research prioritises women’s health, care and wellbeing, and addresses evidence gaps?
• How can we more effectively disseminate research to women, practitioners, decision makers, community leaders and the general public

To help answer these questions, Professor Lucy Chappell, DHSC Chief Scientific Adviser and CEO of the NIHR, recently hosted a roundtable meeting with representatives from DHSC, NIHR, NHS England and the Medical Research Council as well as leading academics.

This explored the best ways to address the under-representation of women across health and care research, including in clinical trials. Four key themes emerged from the discussion.

• Insight: We need to reach people who are persistently under-served by health research. To achieve this, we need to require that results and findings are disaggregated by sex (and other protected characteristics) to understand unmet need.
• Simplicity: We must address system complexity and break down barriers to inclusion. This will rely on a recognition that women’s health is everybody’s business.
• Networks: To ensure that we hear a diversity of women’s voices, we need to encourage and enable our research community to build relationships and trust with women’s networks and the voluntary, community and social enterprise sectors.
• Inclusion: When women - or indeed any other group - are not fully included in health research, their specific needs are not addressed and this ultimately costs the NHS money.

The roundtable marked our first exploratory consultation. There will be opportunities to contribute and we will widen our engagement with other sectors as we proceed.

The consultation for the Women’s Health strategy repeatedly heard from women that our healthcare systems are failing them because NHS services are not designed to meet women’s day-to-day needs. This is echoed in our NIHR Collection about Women’s Health . We are working hard to address this imbalance through research.

As Women’s Health Ambassador Dame Lesley Regan has said, “When we get it right for women, everyone in our society benefits”.

• DHSC Women's Health Strategy for England
• Find out more about how NIHR is promoting inclusive research
• Read Professor Lucy Chappell’s blog for International Women’s Day 2022
• TV presenter and menopause awareness advocate Davina Mcall stressed the importance of women’s health research at a recent NIHR event
• Discover NIHR-funded studies, and other important research, that could support women's health and improve maternity care

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Largest study of UK health research funding released today

1 February 2024

UK health research funding has increased since 2004, reaching £5 billion in 2022 with growth in translational and infection research, but is now plateauing.

A report published today, the UK Health Research Analysis 2022, provides the most detailed overview yet of UK health research funding from 2004 to 2022 from all public sectors, including:

• the governments of the four nations of the UK
• professional bodies

This report is part of a series published every four to five years.

The report was commissioned by the UK Clinical Research Collaboration (UKCRC), a partnership of the main stakeholders that influence clinical research across the business, public and charitable sectors in the UK.

Tracking annual funding

The report found that annual funding had increased overall during this 18 year period, reaching £5 billion in 2022.

Most of this growth was in the first five years covered by the study (2004 to 2009) increasing by only 1.5% annually between 2009 and 2018.

Impact of COVID-19

However, since 2018 this growth has slowed to just 0.2% annually, resulting in a real terms decrease in funding of £110 million between 2018 and 2022.

The report attributes this decrease to both high inflation pressures and a shrinking of the charity sector’s contribution to health research due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on charitable income.

This reduction is offset in part by increased public expenditure driven by the COVID-19 response.

Noteworthy trends

The report also found that funding for research projects over the study period was relatively stable for most areas of health but with some noteworthy trends:

• translational research, in detection and diagnosis, treatment development, and treatment evaluation, received an increasing proportion of total health research spend (up 13.0%, from 22% to 35%) between 2004 and 2022. This resulted in a real term increase of £676 million over 18 years
• prevention research has also received an increased proportion of total health research expenditure (up 4.6%, from 2.5% in 2004 to 7.1% in 2022), meaning a real term increase of £163 million since 2004
• research on discovery science remains strong, accounting for almost half of all funding, but growth in spending has been prioritised to other research activities
• the largest growth has been in infections research (up 6.4%, from 9.0% in 2004 to 15.4% in 2022) as funders sought to address the challenges of antimicrobial resistance, COVID-19 and post-pandemic recovery
• almost a fifth of health funding was spent on cancer research, but this has declined in proportion to overall funding (from 20.3% in 2004 to 16.8% in 2022, down by 2.1% since 2018)

Overview of all public health funding

To produce the report, the authors took an overview of all public funding for health relevant research.

Whether by the government, memberships of societies and professional bodies, or by donation via medical research charities.

The authors then used the Health Research Classification System to identify the main area of health for each research award.

23,500 projects, 173 funding organisations

This system was applied to over 23,500 projects supported by 173 funding organisations, corresponding to just over £5 billion of spend within the UK in 2022.

The analysis showed that of the £5 billion spend:

• £2.8 billion was invested directly on research projects
• £1.4 billion was spent on infrastructure and other indirect support
• £865 million of health-relevant support funding was added from other sources not directly captured in the analysis, such as estimates of university core funding used for biomedical research

The authors then compared the results from 2022 with previous analyses in this report series, in 2004, 2009, 2014 and 2018, to assess how the health research landscape has changed over time.

The UK Health Research Analysis 2022 dataset has been made publicly available so that other funders can perform their own analyses and better support health and biomedical funding in the future.

World-leading research and innovation

Professor Lucy Chappell, Chair of UKCRC, and Chief Scientific Adviser, Department of Health and Social Care, said:

The UK health funding ecosystem successfully brings together government spending with the charity and private sector to drive world-leading discovery research and innovation that is having impact for patients and the public, the NHS, and for the UK life sciences industry. This report shows how the £5 billion annual investment made by public and charitable funders is being spent, including substantial growth in patient-focussed research. We have seen this ecosystem discover and deliver new technologies for early detection and diagnosis alongside new treatments and vaccines for prevention. This was only possible through sustained investment over many decades in discovery science and our translational infrastructure. The health funders across the public, charity and private sectors will continue to work together closely to address the current and future health challenges. UK health research is world-class; we should continue to see increasing research and development funding in order to drive health and economic impact.

Joined-up landscape

Professor Patrick Chinnery, Executive Chair, Medical Research Council (MRC), said:

The MRC is proud to have produced this report on behalf of the UKCRC in collaboration with other funders. The combined analysis shows the UK’s major commitment to health research through a joined-up landscape from basic discovery to clinical translation.

Top image:  Credit: mkurtbas, iStock, Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

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• CORRESPONDENCE
• 11 July 2023

Women’s health: tackle the research funding deficit

• Krina T. Zondervan   ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0275-9905 0 ,
• Linda G. Griffith 1 ,
• Andrew W. Horne 2 ,
• Lone Hummelshoj 3 ,
• Pamela Stratton 4 &
• Stacey A. Missmer   ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3147-6768 5

University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.

University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK.

Endometriosis.org, London, UK.

National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA.

Michigan State University, Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA.

You highlight endometriosis as a condition that receives disproportionately low research funding from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) relative to disease burden ( Nature 617 , 28–29; 2023 ). We argue that your calculated global burden for endometriosis is an underestimate, and that the true disparity between disease burden and funding is even greater.

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Nature 619 , 252 (2023)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-02231-2

The views expressed are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect those of their employers.

Competing Interests

K.T.Z. reports funding to Oxford University from Bayer, Roche, Volition UK, MDNA Life Sciences and Exeltis, and royalty payments from Bayer. Funding has also been received from the NIH, MRC UK, Wellcome, Wellbeing of Women and the European Union. K.T.Z. is a trustee and board member (honorary secretary) of the World Endometriosis Research Foundation, and advanced grants panel member, European Research Council. K.T.Z. has previously served as board member of the World Endometriosis Society and basic science member of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology’s (ESHRE) Special Interest Group for Endometriosis and Endometrial Disorders (SIG-EED). P.S. received royalties from UpToDate for a section about acute pelvic pain, from Frontiers in Reproductive Health as specialty chief editor, gynaecology, and an AbbVie advisory board. Funds for monitoring a clinical trial were provided by Allergan through a clinical trials agreement with the NIH. P.S. receives salary support from Scientific Consulting Group to serve as the obstetric and gynaecological physician lead at the Office of Research on Women’s Health, NIH. A.H.’s institution (University of Edinburgh) received consultancy and grant funding from Roche Diagnostics to assist in endometriosis diagnostic biomarker research, and consultancy fees from Gesynta and Joii. A.H.’s institution has received grant funding from the MRC, NIHR, CSO and Wellbeing of Women for endometriosis research. A.H. received payment for a presentation from Theramex. A.H. is listed as a co-inventor on a UK patent application (no. 2217921·2). A.H. is president-elect of the World Endometriosis Society and co-editor-in-chief of Reproduction and Fertility. A.H. has been a member of the NICE and ESHRE Endometriosis Guideline Groups. A.H. is a trustee and medical adviser to Endometriosis UK (charity). L.G.G. has a patent on a synthetic extracellular matrix for organoid culture and has received funding from Cryotech for development of automated IVF protocols. L.H. is programme manager of the World Endometriosis Research Foundation. S.A.M. receives research support from the NIH, US Department of Defense, AbbVie and Marriott Family Foundations. She is field chief editor for Frontiers in Reproductive Health and has served on advisory boards for AbbVie, Roche and Abbott. S.A.M. is president of the World Endometriosis Society (WES), a trustee for the World Endometriosis Research Foundation (WERF/WERF America), a member of the Society for Women’s Health Research’s (SWHR) Interdisciplinary Network on Female Pelvic Health, and a member of the Statistical Advisory Board for Human Reproduction. In the past, she was chair of the Endometriosis (EndoSIG) and of the Nutrition (NutrSIG) Special Interest Groups for the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM). She also previously served as the international adviser to the ESHRE’s SIG-EED.

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Women’s health needs beyond sexual, reproductive, and maternal health are missing from the government’s 2024 priorities

• Related content
• Peer review
• Alice Witt , research and policy fellow 1 ,
• Kate Womersley , research fellow 1 ,
• Sophie Strachan , chief executive 2 ,
• Jane Hirst , chair of global women’s health 1 ,
• Robyn Norton , chair of global health 1
• 1 The George Institute for Global Health, Imperial College London, UK
• 2 Sophia Forum
• awitt{at}georgeinstitute.org.uk Follow the authors on X @message_tgi ; @alice_witt4 ; @georgeinstuk ; @RobynNorton8 ; @bykatewomersley ; @DrJaneHirst ; @strachansophie

A view of women’s health as synonymous with sexual, reproductive, and maternal health means gaps in health provision across a wider spectrum

Since its launch in 2022, the Women’s Health Strategy for England has made important progress to narrow gaps in women’s health provision, including improved access to hormone replacement therapy and the rollout of specialist women’s health hubs. 1 In January, the government renewed its commitment to the strategy’s 10 year ambitions with the launch of its 2024 priorities: better care for menstrual and gynaecological conditions; expansion of women’s health hubs; tackling inequalities and improving support for vulnerable women, including victims of sexual abuse and violence; bolstering maternity care before, during, and after pregnancy; and more research, backed by National Institute for Health and Care Research Challenge funding of £50m to tackle maternity inequalities. 1 2

Government efforts in these areas are welcome and will narrow critical gaps in funding, research, and care specific to women. The 2024 priorities reinforce, however, a traditional view of women’s health as synonymous with women’s sexual, reproductive, and maternal health. This is a missed opportunity to encourage policymakers, healthcare providers, and the public to take a broader view of women’s health needs across the wider spectrum of illness and over the course of their lives. A broader approach would reduce critical gaps in the evidence base and clinical care relating to diseases and conditions that “present only in women, disproportionately in women, and differently in women,” as emphasised by the Women’s Health Innovation Opportunity Map 2023, an international strategy for advancing evidence and interventions for the care of women and girls. 3

Inequalities in medical knowledge and treatment across many common disease areas, including cardiovascular disease, mental illness, endocrine conditions, and autoimmune disorders, negatively impact women’s morbidity and mortality. 3 These inequalities contribute to women living in poor health for an average of nine years longer than men. 4

Differences exist, for example, in women’s and men’s experiences of heart attacks, including symptoms, age at onset, effective treatments, and overall outcomes. 5 Yet troponin blood tests to diagnose myocardial infarction are often not reported against sex specific thresholds. 6 When such thresholds are used, accurate diagnosis increases by 42% for women. 7 Although diabetes is more prevalent in men than women, women are at greater risk of diabetes related mortality than men and have a greater risk of complications, such as a 27% higher excess risk of stroke 8 and a 44% higher excess risk of coronary heart disease. 9 Women are, however, less likely than men to receive the care recommended by clinical guidelines, and guidelines are not routinely sex specific. 10

Robust testing of treatments that are effective for women is also lacking. This is the case across diseases with the highest morbidity burden in women—heart disease and cancer—as well as conditions for which high prevalence among and impact on women is under-recognised. For example, women comprise 52% of the global HIV population, yet continue to be under-represented in anti-retroviral drug trials, limiting knowledge of effective treatments for women and exposing them to potentially harmful side effects. 11 Moreover, though changes in women’s physiology across the life course (including menarche, pregnancy, and menopause) considerably affect their experiences of health and disease, 12 medical knowledge about appropriate care at these life stages is limited. Sex and gender data gaps mean that there is limited guidance for HIV positive women on managing menopause symptoms, despite women with HIV experiencing more severe symptoms which mirror untreated HIV. 13 As more women with chronic conditions reach midlife and beyond, there is an urgent need to fill these gaps in the evidence base.

The strategy’s renewed commitment to enhancing maternity care and research should also advance understanding about the interaction between pregnancy and long term health conditions. Illnesses that develop in pregnancy, such as gestational diabetes or pre-eclampsia, greatly increase the longer term risks of developing cardiometabolic disease. 14 15 Longer term surveillance and prevention efforts are needed to minimise the development of diabetes and hypertension in later life, but follow-up in primary care is often limited. 16 Robust preconception care for women with chronic health conditions also minimises the frequency of complications, risks associated with taking medications with potential to cause fetal abnormalities, and detrimental effects of poor nutrition on pregnancy outcomes. 17 These imperatives are recognised by NICE and other groups, but access to critical services, such as obstetric physicians and perinatal psychiatry teams, remains patchy. 18 19

For conditions that affect both women and men, investments are needed to break the default of research being conducted primarily on men and generalised to everyone else. The strategy’s priority to improve inclusion of women in medical research 1 is essential, and this must be paired with a commitment to ensuring sex and gender disaggregated analyses are conducted and reported as standard. 20 Investments are required to support research on sex and gender differences across all disease areas, as well as development of appropriate sex and gender specific clinical guidelines. In spring 2024, the Medical Science Sex and Gender Equity (Message) project 21 will launch a policy framework co-designed by representatives across the UK research sector, including the country’s leading medical research funders, to improve how medical research accounts for sex and gender. Funders and the wider research sector set out their support for new sex and gender policies in statements of intent published in December 2023. 22 23 Adoption of these policies by medical research funders in the UK can shift how researchers consider the importance of these variables, leading to better research and deeper knowledge about women’s health throughout their lives, and ultimately more tailored and effective clinical care.

Providing equitable healthcare for women is the right thing to do and is financially intelligent. Investment in the broad scope of health conditions that affect girls and women throughout their lives could contribute an estimated $1tn a year globally to economic productivity by 2040. 4 The Women’s Health Strategy’s priorities are critical for achieving positive change, but to truly take advantage of this opportunity, 2025’s priorities will need to tackle women’s wider health needs. By investing in narrowing the sex and gender data gap and developing sex and gender specific guidelines for care, the strategy will have a meaningful and long lasting impact for women and girls across the course of their lives.

SS has done paid consultancy for ViiV Pharmaceutical, receiving travel and hotel expenses and an honorarium. JH is UKRI Future Leaders Fellow; Wellcome award for research on the biologic effects of extreme heat in pregnancy. RN was a board member for George Health Enterprises, the commercial arm of the George Institute for Global Health. George Health Enterprises recently sold one of its businesses and RN received payment. KW and RN lead the Medical Science Sex and Gender Equity (MESSAGE) project at the George Institute for Global Health, funded by the Wellcome Trust. AW is a research and policy fellow on the MESSAGE project.

Not commissioned, not externally peer reviewed.

• ↵ Department of Health and Social Care. Health Secretary announces new women’s health priorities for 2024. 2024. www.gov.uk/government/news/health-secretary-announces-new-womens-health-priorities-for-2024
• ↵ National Institute for Health and Care Research. NIHR challenge—maternity inequalities. 2024. www.nihr.ac.uk/funding/nihr-challenge-maternity-inequalities/35383
• ↵ Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, National Institutes of Health. Women’s health innovation opportunity map 2023: 50 high-return opportunities to advance global women’s health R&D. 2023. https://orwh.od.nih.gov/sites/orwh/files/docs/womens-health-rnd-opportunity-map_2023_508.pdf
• ↵ World Economic Forum. Closing the women’s health gap: A $1 trillion opportunity to improve lives and economies. 2024. www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Closing_the_Women%E2%80%99s_Health_Gap_2024.pdf
• Millett ERC ,
• Peters SAE ,
• Chapman AR ,
• Fujisawa T ,
• High-STEACS Investigators
• Peters SA ,
• Huxley RR ,
• ↵ The Lancet Diabetes Endocrinology. Sex disparities in diabetes: bridging the gap . Lancet Diabetes Endocrinol 2017 ; 5 : 839 doi: 10.1016/S2213-8587(17)30336-4 OpenUrl CrossRef
• Farooq HZ ,
• Kasadha B ,
• Shifren J ,
• Corless I ,
• Behrens I ,
• Vounzoulaki E ,
• Davies MJ ,
• Toulis KA ,
• Stephenson J ,
• Schoenaker DA ,
• UK Preconception Partnership
• Watt-Coote I ,
• Coleman M ,
• Nelson-Piercy C
• ↵ Maternal Mental Health Alliance. 16 389 women were unable to access essential perinatal mental health care last year. 2022. https://maternalmentalhealthalliance.org/news/thousands-unable-access-essential-perinatal-mental-health-care
• ↵ Department of Health and Social Care. Women’s health strategy for England. 2022. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6308e552e90e0729e63d39cb/Womens-Health-Strategy-England-web-accessible.pdf
• Medical Science Sex and Gender Equity
• ↵ Medical Science Sex and Gender Equity. Top UK biomedical research funders support first-of-its-kind sex and gender policy in major sector turning point. 2023. www.messageproject.co.uk/news/top-uk-biomedical-research-funders-support-first-of-its-kind-sex-and-gender-policy-in-major-sector-turning-point
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Largest analysis of UK health research funding published

A report published on 28 January 2020 delivers the most comprehensive analysis of UK health research funding ever compiled. Bringing together data from 146 charity, professional and public sector organisations, the  UK Health Research Analysis 2018  found that in 2018 these funders contributed £4.8 billion to support research to improve human health.

The report was compiled by a collaboration of 12 public and charitable funders led by the Medical Research Council, on behalf of the  UK Clinical Research Collaboration  (UKCRC). The UKCRC partnership supports coordination and collaboration between the major stakeholders that influence clinical research in the UK, and these efforts are underpinned by an analysis of UK health research funding every four to five years.

This latest report is the  fourth in a series  that charts changes in health research over the last 14 years. From 2004 to 2009, the reports found that public and charitable support for health research grew, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.5%, then over the last ten years funding for health research remained, in real terms, almost level with a CAGR of 1.5% (2009 to 2018).

The report notes that main areas to receive the highest increases in proportion of investment were research activities important for translation - research that aids translating scientific discoveries into new treatments and healthcare benefits. Early detection of disease and the development and evaluation of new treatments were the main areas that received increased funding, totalling £523 million over 14 years.

Half of public and charity support for health research was directed at basic science, which underpins further study or seeks to identify the causes and progression of disease. It is this discovery science that will provide a pipeline of new potentially transformative ideas, technologies and methods for the future.

Funders have continued to increase funding for other areas, such as prevention-related research (e.g. vaccine development and smoking/dietary interventions), that were identified as having lower investment in previous UK health research analyses.

The report highlights that public and charity funders support research into a diverse range of disease areas, with the largest increase in support for research into infectious diseases. While disease burden in the UK in this area is low, this research includes efforts to combat the global health risk of pandemics and antimicrobial resistance.

Cancer research continued to attract a substantial proportion of total funding, with high levels of charity support. Cancer is the disease that leads to the highest UK disease burden, according to the World Health Organisation.

The report includes data from 82 new funders – bringing the total of 146 funders to more than double the number included in the 2014 report – and included coding of over 22,500 projects.

It is the first report in the series to undertake a detailed analysis of international funding support for UK research teams (totalling £240 million income to the UK in 2018) and the first to record UK funder contributions to research overseas (totalling £220 million funding to 66 countries in 2018).

In addition to the £4.8 billion of public and charity 2018 funding detailed in this report, the authors have provided estimates for the total expenditure on health research in the UK. Estimates for expenditure in the pharmaceutical sector (£4.3 billion in 2017, continuing the recent recovery following the economic crisis of 2008), brought the estimated total for UK health research to £8.67 billion.

To download the report see the  HRCS Online website .

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Population and Health Data Science: Fully Funded Health Data Research UK PhD Scholarship: Use of Real-World Evidence in Health Technology Assessment for Multiple Long-term Conditions (RS600)

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Closing date: 12 May 2024

Key Information

Funding provider:   Health Data Research (HDR) UK

Subject areas:   Population Data Science

Project start date:

• 1  October 202 4 ( Enrolment open from mid-September )

Project supervisors:

• Professor Rhiannon Owen ( r.k.owen @swansea.ac.uk )
• Dr James Rafferty
• Professor Hamish Laing
• Professor Keith Abrams (University of Warwick)

Aligned programme of study: PhD in Population and Health Data Science

Mode of study: Full-time

Project description:

Healthcare decision-making has previously focussed on developing recommendations for single conditions. However, standardised care for each chronic condition in isolation can be inappropriate for individuals living with multiple long-term conditions known as multimorbidity, and may lead to unnecessary polypharmacy. This PhD studentship aims to develop a modelling framework to estimate the natural history of disease in individuals living with multiple long-term conditions using population-scale, linked, electronic health records from the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage (SAIL) Databank Wales Multimorbidity e-Cohort ( Lyons et al , 2021 ). This approach will allow estimation of the potential adverse effects (such as hospitalisations) of drug-on-drug interactions for the treatment of multiple conditions and associated genetic, environmental, or demographic risk factors. Further this PhD project will compare the efficacy of different combinations of treatments used in people with multiple long-term conditions, and assess potential health inequalities.   

Facilities 

The PhD student will be based in Population Data Science at Swansea University with visiting PhD Student Status at the Department of Statistics at the University of Warwick, benefiting from the stimulating and supportive environment and bespoke training programmes. The successful candidate will receive training to develop their knowledge and expertise in statistical modelling, epidemiology, population data science and health technology assessment, with the opportunity for their research to directly inform healthcare policy and practice. The successful student will have the opportunity to present their work at national and international conferences and workshops.  

This PhD is funded as part of the HDR UK Medicines in Acute and Chronic Care Driver Programme, which is a national collaboration that aims to understand and transform the use of medicines for patient benefit, and reduce medicines-associated harm. The Driver Programme has a particular focus on vulnerable populations including people living with multiple long-term conditions and those experiencing health inequalities. The successful candidate will be one of several PhD students contributing to the wider HDR UK Driver Programmes and will have the opportunity to collaborate with the wider HDR UK Driver Programme Team as well as access additional training and associated events hosted by HDR UK. 

Eligibility

Candidates must hold an Upper Second Class (2.1) honours degree. Candidates  will need an MSc in Statistics/Biostatistics or Epidemiology/Health Data Science (with a strong analytical component ) plus programming and data analysis skills/experience in R and/or Python.  

Experience of analysing large-scale linked electronic health record data and k nowledge of Bayesian methods would be an advantage.

If you are eligible to apply for the scholarship but do not hold a UK degree, you can check our comparison entry requirements (see  country specific qualifications ). Please note that you may need to provide evidence of your English Language proficiency. 

This scholarship is open to candidates of any nationality.

If you have any questions regarding your academic or fee eligibility based on the above, please email  [email protected]  with the web-link to the scholarship(s) you are interested in. 

This scholarship covers the full cost of tuition fees and an annual stipend of £ 19,237.

Additional research expenses will also be available.

How to Apply

To apply, please  complete your application online   with the following information:

In the event you have already applied for the above programme previously, the application system may issue a warning notice and prevent application, in this event, please email [email protected] where staff will be happy to assist you in submitting your application.

• Start year  – please select  2024
• Funding (page 8)  –
• ‘Are you funding your studies yourself?’ – please select  No
• ‘Name of Individual or organisation providing funds for study’ – please enter  ‘RS600 - Health Technology Assessment'

*It is the responsibility of the applicant to list the above information accurately when applying, please note that applications received without the above information listed will not be considered for the scholarship award.

One application is required per individual Swansea University led research scholarship award ; applications cannot be considered listing multiple Swansea University led research scholarship awards.

We encourage you to complete the following to support our commitment to providing an environment free of discrimination and celebrating diversity at Swansea University: 

• Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Monitoring Form  (online form)  

As part of your online application, you MUST upload the following documents (please do not send these via e-mail).  We strongly advise you to provide the listed supporting documents by the advertised application closing date.  Please note that your application may not be considered without the documents listed:

• Degree certificates and transcripts  (if you are currently studying for a degree, screenshots of your grades to date are sufficient)
• A cover letter  including a ‘Supplementary Personal Statement’ to explain why the position particularly matches your skills and experience and how you choose to develop the project.
• Two references  (academic or previous employer) on headed paper or using the  Swansea University reference form . Please note that we are not able to accept references received citing private email accounts, e.g. Hotmail. Referees should cite their employment email address for verification of reference.
• Evidence of meeting  English Language requirement  (if applicable).
• Copy of  UK resident visa  (if applicable)
• C onfirmation of EDI form submission (optional)

Informal enquiries are welcome, please contact Professor  Rhiannon Owen  ( r.k.owen @swansea.ac.uk ).

*External Partner Application Data Sharing  – Please note that as part of the scholarship application selection process, application data sharing may occur with external partners outside of the University, when joint/co- funding of a scholarship project is applicable.

UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health

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New national research centres to unlock tests and treatments for rare diseases

23 April 2024

UCL scientists will work to help thousands of people living with rare diseases get access to improved diagnostics, treatments and potentially cures, thanks to funding for four new research centres.

The LifeArc Translational Centres for Rare Diseases (including the LifeArc Centre for Rare Mitochondrial Diseases, LifeArc Centre for Rare Kidney Diseases, LifeArc Centre for Rare Respiratory Diseases and the LifeArc Centre for Acceleration of Rare Disease Trials) have been awarded nearly £40million over five years and will focus on areas where there are significant unmet needs. They will tackle barriers that ordinarily prevent new tests and treatments reaching patients with rare diseases and speed up the delivery of rare disease treatment trials.

The centres will bring together leading scientists and rare disease clinical specialists from across the UK for the first time; encouraging new collaborations across different research disciplines and providing improved access to facilities and training.

The LifeArc Centre for Rare Mitochondrial Diseases is a national partnership with the Lily Foundation and Muscular Dystrophy UK. It will be co-led by Professor Michael Hanna (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery).

Mitochondrial diseases are genetic disorders affecting one in 5,000 people. They often cause progressive damage to the brain, eyes, muscles, heart and liver, leading to severe disability and a shorter life.

There is currently no cure for most mitochondrial conditions. However, new opportunities to treat mitochondrial diseases have been identified in the last five years, meaning that it’s a critical time for research development.

The new £7.5million centre will establish a national platform that will connect patient groups, knowledge and infrastructure in order to develop biomarkers and accelerate new treatments getting to clinical trial.

UCL lead, Professor Michael Hanna, said:“ Since the original discovery at Queen Square in 1988 that mutations in mitochondrial DNA can cause human disease we have pursued a strong multidisciplinary research programme to determine disease mechanisms and advance treatment opportunities. Crucially, our work is centred around patients and, in London, we lead the NHS England national highly specialised service for mitochondrial diseases."

Professor Robert Pitceathly (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology), who will co-lead at UCL, said: “This new funding to establish a national translational centre is a major development and will enable our science to be translated into new biomarkers, clinical trials and ultimately treatments. A strong training component will allow us to train the next generation of researchers.”

Professor Alan Thompson Dean UCL Faculty of Brain Sciences said: “I am delighted to congratulate Professors Hanna and Pitceathly and the UCL team for securing this major collaborative award. It builds on a strong foundation of excellent genetic and neuroscience research that the new LifeArc Centre will help translate into trials and ultimately treatments to benefit patients and families globally.”

Globally, there are more than 300 million people living with rare diseases. However, rare disease research can be fragmented. Currently researchers can lack access to specialist facilities, as well as advice on regulation, trial designs, preclinical regulatory requirements, and translational project management, which are vital in getting new innovations to patients.

UCL researchers will also play a key role in the new £9.4million LifeArc Centre for Rare Respiratory Diseases. The centre will be co-led by Professor Hannah Mitchison (UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health) alongside academic partners in Edinburgh, Nottingham, Dundee, Cambridge, Southampton and the UKRI Nucleic Acid Therapy Accelerator (NATA) – with the aim of uniting children, adults and families with clinical experts, researchers, investors and industry leaders.

The LifeArc Centre for Rare Respiratory Diseases collaboration will create a UK-wide bank of anonymised tissue samples and models of disease, allowing researchers to advance pioneering therapies. It will work to lower the risk of investment in rare respiratory disease research, building the partnerships and innovative infrastructure needed for clinical trials in patients with rare conditions. The centre team also aims to boost public awareness of the realities of living with rare respiratory diseases and raise patient awareness of resources that can improve their quality of life. It is supported by patient groups including PCD Research, PCD Support UK, Action for Pulmonary Fibrosis, Childhood Interstitial Lung Disease and LAM Action.

Professor Hannah Mitchison, the UCL lead, said: “I am thrilled to be part of this major translational initiative, it offers significant prospects to unify research for better recognition of rare respiratory diseases such as primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD) through diagnostics and mechanistic understanding, paving the way for creation of novel therapeutics. We have a unique opportunity working together with LifeArc, our academic partners, NATA, the affected families and their advocates, to develop national infrastructure and biobanking that ensures no patient is left behind in development and trials of new products and therapies for these debilitating and critical disorders.”

Dr Catriona Crombie, Head of Rare Disease at LifeArc, says: “We’re extremely proud to be launching four new LifeArc Translational Centres for Rare Diseases. Each centre has been awarded funding because it holds real promise for delivering change for people living with rare diseases. These centres also have the potential to create a blueprint for accelerating improvements across other disease areas, including common diseases.” 

Patient stories

Adam Harraway  has Mitochondrial Disease and says he lives in constant fear of what might go wrong next with his condition. He says: “With rare diseases such as these, it can feel like the questions always outweigh the answers. The news of this investment from LifeArc fills me with hope for the future. To know that there are so many wonderful people and organisations working towards treatments and cures makes me feel seen and heard. It gives a voice to people who often have to suffer in silence, and I'm excited to see how this project can help Mito patients in the future."

Former BBC News journalist and presenter,  Philippa Thomas , has the rare incurable lung disease, Lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM). Philippa’s condition has stabilised but for many people, the disease can be severely life-limiting. Philippa explains: “There is so little research funding for rare respiratory diseases, that getting treatment - let alone an accurate diagnosis - really does feel like a lottery. It is also terrifying being diagnosed with something your GP will never have heard of.  I am one of the lucky patients not to be relying on bottles of oxygen or surviving with a lung transplant. I’ve only had a kidney tumour removed and one lung pinned in place. But even as a woman living a relatively normal life with LAM, I am overjoyed at the prospect of a new LifeArc centre for Rare Respiratory Diseases. It represents new and significant hope for all RRD patients and their families - hope that we can speed up and bring together the provision of essential information, access to specialised care, new clinical trials, and above all a future with a cure.”

• Professor Michael Hanna's academic profile
• Professor Robert Pitceathly's academic profile
• Professor Hannah Mitchison's academic profile
• UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology
• UCL Brain Sciences
• UCL Population Health Sciences
• Credit:  Wasan Tita  on iStock

Media contact 

Poppy tombs .

E: p.tombs [at] ucl.ac.uk

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Healey announces $3 million in grants for women's health research projects

• katielannan

Women's health is getting a big boost from Gov. Maura Healey's administration.

The governor on Tuesday announced nearly $3 million in grant money to support 15 projects , including efforts to diagnose and treat endometriosis, develop less invasive screenings for cervical cancer, and advance new technologies to better understand pregnancy risks.

Healey announced the grants during a visit to Brigham and Women's Hospital. Healey toured the hospital's Mary Horrigan Connors Center for Women's Health and Gender Biology, one of a series of stops she's making around the state to promote a sweeping economic development bill she filed last month.

“We have not done what we needed to do for women's health for centuries,” Healey said. “And I am so psyched, as your governor, that people are actually looking at this and dealing with this, because it is different.”

Related Stories

$21 million in federal funds will boost boston's response to youth mental health crisis, embracing midwifery could change the state of maternal healthcare in massachusetts, women of color share their stories of breast cancer treatment and survivorship.

The bulk of the grant money, $2.6 million, comes from the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center women's health innovation program, with another $250,000 from the First Look Awards, a partnership between the life sciences center and the Connors Center at Brigham and Women's.

The Healey administration says the governor's $3.5 billion economic development bill will “reenergize” the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center to help grow and sustain what has become a major industry in Massachusetts.

The bill proposes a 10-year, $1 billion reauthorization of a life sciences initiative that began under then-Gov. Deval Patrick in 2008, including money for tax credits, workforce development programs and more.

Economic Development Secretary Yvonne Hao said the life sciences push includes “all of health care.”

“Life sciences, including the whole system. We are trying to be more ambitious, just like ARPA-H,” Hao said, referencing a new health innovation hub Massachusetts will host for a federal research agency. “We want to solve these big, hard problems, like all of these women's health issues. This is the time for us to continue to lead.”

Healey's bill is before the Legislature's Economic Development and Emerging Technologies, which has until the end of May to complete its review of the bill.

Meanwhile, lawmakers are also weighing how to best respond to the financial crisis at Steward Health Care, amid concerns that any disruption at the for-profit system's eight Massachusetts hospitals could reverberate across the state's health care ecosystem as a whole. Both state legislators and U.S. senators held hearings on Beacon Hill last month to explore the role of private equity in health care .

Kate Walsh, Healey's health and human services secretary, told reporters after the grant announcement that the country's health care system is complicated and she worries “about broad brushstrokes that say, 'private equity bad, not-for-profit good.”

“I think we have seen an extreme set of circumstances that the choices that Steward made as a health system to capitalize their system just didn't work,” Walsh said. “And so what we need to do, when we get patients and staff and people and regions through this, is sort of step back. I think legislation in haste, you kind of repent in leisure, so I think there's a lot to consider.”

Explore Topics:

More politics.

Would Rep. Katherine Clark vote to oust Speaker Johnson? ‘One step at a time,’ she says

How MBTA chief Eng is rebuilding trust after one year on the job

ShotSpotter aims to detect gunshots instantly. The ACLU says it's ineffective.

Mass. AG plans to go after AI scammers

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• Health and social care
• VCSE Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025: women's reproductive wellbeing in the workplace
• Department of Health & Social Care

Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025: women’s reproductive wellbeing in the workplace

Updated 24 June 2022

Applies to England

© Crown copyright 2022

This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: [email protected] .

Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.

This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vcse-health-and-wellbeing-fund-2022-to-2025-womens-reproductive-wellbeing-in-the-workplace/vcse-health-and-wellbeing-fund-2022-to-2025-womens-reproductive-wellbeing-in-the-workplace

Information pack for voluntary, community and social enterprise ( VCSE ) sector organisations

Note on language

Note that the fund is aimed at providing support to all women and those assigned female at birth. While in this document we refer to women, we recognise that some transgender men, non-binary people and people with variations in sex characteristics ( VSC ) or who are intersex may also experience some of the same issues covered.

Executive summary

Purpose of this information pack.

The Department of Health and Social Care ( DHSC ), and NHS England and NHS Improvement ( NHSEI ), the system partners, are seeking applications from VCSE sector organisations for the next round of the Health and Wellbeing Fund.

This information pack provides VCSE organisations with the information required to make an application to the fund. Read all the sections carefully to ensure your organisation and project or programme is eligible.

The system partners value the significant contribution that the VCSE sector makes towards improving health and care. We see the VCSE sector as a key partner in delivering our strategic priorities and improving health and wellbeing across England.

To support this, the system partners are jointly releasing the VCSE Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025 to support projects and programmes led by VCSE organisations.

The theme of the 2022 to 2025 fund is women’s reproductive wellbeing in the workplace. Linking in with the development of the new Women’s Health Strategy (see Annex 1), this fund aims to support VCSE organisations who can provide a holistic support offer to assist women experiencing reproductive health issues (for example, menopause, fertility problems, miscarriage and pregnancy loss, menstrual health and gynaecological conditions) to remain in and return to the workplace. The fund aims to align with the Women’s Health Strategy aims for health in the workplace:

• women feel supported in the workplace
• taboos are broken down through open conversation
• employers feel well equipped to support women in managing their health within the workplace

Workplace awareness, training and support via employee assistance programmes will be key to fulfil these aims. We welcome applications for programmes to the Health and Wellbeing Fund that aim to provide training and awareness for small and medium enterprises ( SMEs ) where assistance schemes are unlikely to be available.

We are also interested in hearing from organisations who wish to provide expert work and health support to women experiencing reproductive health issues that are impacting their experience in the workplace. In particular, those women at risk of leaving employment or who have recently fallen out of work and are less likely to have access to expert work and health support, such as occupational health support, via their employer. For example, these may be women working for small employers or the self-employed. Further detail on what is meant by ‘expert work and health support’ is covered in Section 1, ‘Aims of the Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025’.

Funding is available for grants between £200,000 to £600,000 per applicant, to expand or develop projects or programmes in these areas. Applications with a commitment secured for additional funding will be prioritised but all applications will be considered. More detail is provided in Section 2, ‘Fund criteria’.

Key dates for VCSE Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025

The closing date is fixed. Note that other dates in this timeline are indicative and for guidance only.

The closing date for applications is 9am on Friday 5 August 2022.

Note that all awards are subject to the approval of budgets as part of annual budgetary planning by DHSC . The launch of this scheme in financial year 2022 to 2023 does not commit DHSC to the funding of any grant awards.

Strategic context

The fund will support the delivery of the system partner’s strategic priorities, with a continued focus on promoting equality and reducing health inequalities. These strategic priorities are outlined in:

• the NHS Long Term Plan , published in January 2019 with the aim to make the NHS fit for the future and get the most value for patients
• the Department of Health and Social Care’s Outcome Delivery Plan (published annually), which commits to keeping people healthy and independent in their communities, supporting the transformation of NHS Primary, community and mental health services, and local authority public health and social care
• the Health is Everyone’s Business consultation , originally published in July 2019 with the government response in July 2021, which set out key proposals aiming to minimise the risk of ill health-related job loss
• the first Women’s Health Strategy for England, which will be published in 2022, marking a reset in the way in which the government is looking at women’s health. The strategy follows on from the Vision , in which health in the workplace is a key theme
• Annex 1, which provides specific content on the policy context for women’s reproductive health in the workplace

The VCSE Health and Wellbeing Programme ( HW Programme) was launched in April 2017 following publication of the VCSE review . The review looked at the role of the VCSE sector in improving health, wellbeing and care outcomes. The HW Programme is a joint initiative by DHSC and NHSEI (the system partners).

The programme enables the system partners to work together with the VCSE sector to promote equality, improve health inequalities and to help families and communities to achieve and maintain wellbeing.

The HW Programme’s objectives are to:

• encourage co-production in the creation of person-centred, community-based health and care which promotes equality for all
• enable the voice of people with lived experience and experiencing health inequalities to inform national policy making and shape service delivery
• build evidence of sustainable, scalable solutions to mitigate and prevent inequalities impacting on health and wellbeing of communities

The HW Programme consists of:

• a national partnership arrangement: the VCSE Health and Wellbeing Alliance ( HW Alliance)
• funding for bespoke projects and programmes: the VCSE Health and Wellbeing Fund ( HW Fund)

VCSE Health and Wellbeing Alliance 2021 to 2024

Note that this information pack is not for the HW Alliance, and this section is for background only.

The refreshed HW Alliance launched in April 2021 with a membership of 19 organisations from across the VCSE sector.

The HW Alliance facilitates collaborative working between the VCSE and statutory sectors and brings the voices and expertise of the VCSE sector, and the people they represent, into national policy development and delivery.

The refreshed HW Alliance builds on the successes of the previous programme with greater alignment to the national strategic priorities of the system partners while maintaining a continued focus on promoting equality and reducing health inequalities.

VCSE Health and Wellbeing Fund

The aim of the fund is to promote equalities and reduce health inequalities by building the evidence base about good practice, sharing lessons, and widening the adoption of interventions with a proven track record.

The fund focuses on one specific theme each year, which is agreed across the system partners and in co-production with the VCSE sector.

The most recent 3 year Health and Wellbeing Fund was around the theme of Starting Well, focusing on maternity projects aiming to improve health outcomes for children from pre-conception to 2.5 years in areas of high deprivation (including rural, coastal and urban areas) and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic ( BAME ) groups. There were 19 successful applicants.

Due to COVID-19, a one-year fund was launched in 2021 which focused on the role of the VCSE sector in providing support for respiratory illnesses in children. There were 13 successful applicants.

Further information

Updates from the HW Programme, including information on the Health and Wellbeing Fund, can be received by signing up to the DHSC monthly newsletter .

1. Aims of the Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025

The theme of the Health and Wellbeing Fund 2022 to 2025 is women’s reproductive wellbeing in the workplace. The fund aims are set out below.

Target communities

The target community for the fund is women of working age experiencing reproductive health issues.

Types of support

The Health and Wellbeing Fund will support projects and programmes that are working with target communities and provide:

• workplace awareness and training for small and medium enterprises ( SMEs ) where assistance schemes are unlikely to be available (see Annex 1)
• ‘upstream’ support for people to remain in work or return to work, including following a sickness absence
• light-touch, ‘biopsychosocial’ approaches, helping individuals to address their holistic health, personal and workplace barriers to employment
• case management
• signposting to both clinical services (for example, mental health services, physiotherapy) and wider, local, services (for example, debt advice, CV and interview coaching, wellbeing support)
• delivery by multidisciplinary teams, involving clinical or non-clinical professionals (including in case manager roles)

As services often include clinical and non-clinical support, we know that VCSE organisations can play an important role in delivering services and coordinating delivery of services through their relationships with local stakeholders (clinical and non-clinical).

Health outcomes

There are strong links between health and employment, with a robust evidence base showing both that good work is good for physical and mental health and wellbeing, and that employment is a primary determinant of health. Higher healthy life expectancy is strongly correlated with higher employment rates, and the most deprived local areas experience the worst health and employment outcomes. Moving from employment to unemployment is estimated to increase GP consultation rates for an individual by 50% [footnote 1] .

Whole system-centred approaches

The Health and Wellbeing Fund will support the following types of approaches:

whole system-centred approaches – whole systems working recognises that there is no one solution to tackle complex public health issues. A coordinated, collaborative approach is needed, aligned to a ‘health in all policies’ approach

whole system community-centred approaches support NHS England’s work to deliver a comprehensive model for universal personalised care. This includes building healthy and resilient communities to help keep the whole population healthy. Taking a strategic, asset-based approach to empowering individuals and communities is also a key focus for improving social care outcomes

Further information can be found in Community Centred Public Health: Taking a whole system approach .

Additional aims

Additional aims of the fund are to:

• expand or develop projects and programmes that have a whole system approach
• promote equalities and reduce health inequalities for women
• support strong and sustainable local connections between VCSE and statutory services, without duplicating other existing initiatives
• facilitate co-production between local partners and service users
• evaluate different approaches and share learning

Further information on the policy context and priorities for women’s reproductive health in the workplace is contained in Annex 1.

Intended outcomes

The intended outcomes of the Health and Wellbeing Fund are:

• an increase in system partners’ evidence base on sustainable and scalable whole system centred approaches to reduce health inequalities for women in the workplace
• the production of evidence and findings from VCSE -led projects and programmes that can be disseminated to different audiences across the system to inform and influence local and national policy and practice
• an increase in the capability for the VCSE sector to capture and evaluate the impact of their work, to demonstrate to policy leads the benefits of their projects or programmes with specific communities

2. Fund criteria

To be considered for grant funding the application must demonstrate it supports the aims of the fund by meeting all the following criteria.

Expansion of an existing scheme or development of a new scheme or programme

The proposed expansion of an existing scheme or development of a new scheme should not simply aim to make a scheme larger or to support geographical extensions; instead, applicants must clearly demonstrate the need for expanding an existing scheme or launching a new programme through highlighting a gap in the evidence base. This should enable an existing scheme to achieve additional outcomes or to reach a different audience, or enable the development of a new programme of work.

Grant and additional funding

The fund will grant fund projects over a period of 3 financial years, until March 2025. Grants between £200,000 to £600,000 per applicant will be available to expand or develop schemes, up to a maximum of £200,000 per financial year. It is anticipated that we will fund approximately 15 to 20 projects and programmes.

Applicants are required to provide a supporting letter from their local statutory commissioner – for example, clinical commissioning group ( CCG ), sustainability and transformation partnership ( STP ), integrated care system ( ICS ), or local authority, and are strongly encouraged to obtain additional funding that supports their project or programme from statutory or non-statutory partners. Applications with a commitment secured for additional funding will be prioritised but all applications will be considered.

Note that DHSC will not be able to provide additional funding to cover any shortfall in local resourcing, and that grants from the fund must be used within the funding year in which they are allocated.

After grant funding over a period of 3 financial years ending March 2025, projects that are successful are expected to find ongoing funding and demonstrate sustainability.

Demonstrate sustainability of the organisation

Applicants will need to confirm that they have suitable funding for the rest of their organisation for 3 years (the length of the fund grant). There is no restriction as to where this funding should be from (for example, statutory provider, other VCSE organisation, the Big Lottery Fund, and so on).

Organisational eligibility

Organisations must:

• meet the conditions set out in Section 70 of the Charities Act 2006 to be eligible to receive a grant for the Health and Wellbeing Fund, and subject to completion of due diligence processes. A summary of the legal criteria in Section 70 is set out in Annex 2
• work in England, with a plan to operate their project or programme in England only. There are separate arrangements for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
• incorporated (this would be a company limited by guarantee and registered with Companies House OR a community interest company OR a co-operative or industrial and provident society OR a social enterprise); or
• have charitable status (registered with the Charity Commission)
• not apply for grant funding amount of more than 25% of their current annual turnover, as demonstrated by their audited or independently examined accounts
• have an equal opportunities, health and safety and safeguarding policy
• have been operating in this area, or a closely related area, for at least the last 3 years
• demonstrate that they have a clear connection to work within local communities (either as a local or national VCSE organisation)

Joint applications

We welcome joint applications, for example, collaborations between VCSE organisations. There is no limit to the number of partners. However, we require one partner to take the lead and complete a significant proportion of the project or programme activity.

Local health connections

Applicants must clearly demonstrate how the project or programme is strategically linked up with other local initiatives, and that is not duplicating another local initiative.

A letter of support from a relevant body will be required for all applications.

Co-produced

Applicants must clearly demonstrate how their proposed expansion or development of the project or programme has been, or will be, developed in co-production with those that the project or programme seeks to benefit.

To achieve the aims and outcomes of the fund, applicants must commit to completing an evaluation and sharing learning with the system partners.

Applicants will be required to commission an external evaluator for their individual projects or programmes, with at least 5% of the budget to be dedicated to evaluation.

In detailing their evaluation plan for the end of the proposed project or programme, applicants will be required to set out which data they already collect and plan to collect, what outcomes they seek to achieve, how they will measure them over time, and how they plan to share their learning.

The evaluation should be a ‘rolling’ evaluation where data will need to be routinely collected and available to system partners for monitoring of the projects funded. The evaluation should formally report, alongside reporting on the project outcomes at the end of year 3 (financial year 2024 to 2025).

Note that the system partners will request that some standard evaluation criteria are built into the evaluation process to allow comparison, where possible, across grant funded projects. Information on this will be provided to successful projects.

Successful projects will also need to commit to sharing learning with the system partners through the evaluation and other queries, to help learn what works when supporting women with reproductive health issues in the workplace.

Monitoring and reporting

Minimum reporting requirements have been identified for funded schemes. Successful organisations will need to agree to these monitoring and reporting arrangements at the outset, which will align to the Cabinet Office Functional Standards. Organisations that do not meet these requirements may risk having future grant payments withheld.

What we will not fund

We are only able to fund projects and programmes that meet all the criteria and eligibility requirements.

This funding is for VCSE organisations only; VCSE organisations may work with other bodies from other sectors, but a VCSE must be the lead applicant.

The Health and Wellbeing Fund will not fund national VCSE organisations unless it is clear that they are directly working with local communities.

3. Application process

Applicants are required to complete the application form published alongside this information pack and provide all the supporting information outlined below, submitting this to [email protected] no later than Friday 5 August 2022 at 9am. Note that applications submitted after the deadline, even due to circumstances beyond applicants’ control, will not be considered.

The assessment process will be conducted by a panel made up of representatives from each of the system partner organisations. The panel will assess applications against the criteria set out, and they may wish to discuss your proposal in more detail. Each application will also undergo a due diligence process by DHSC to ensure that the organisation is suitable to receive grant funding.

Meet the funder webinars

Interested organisations will be able to take part in webinars involving policy leads from the system partners, to hear about the fund and gather further information on what projects and programmes we are specifically interested in funding. A set of Frequently Asked Questions will be generated during the application process and shared online for reference.

There will be 2 webinars, and you are strongly advised to register to attend one. Registration will be limited to one person per organisation, and will be allocated on a first come, first served basis. Webinars will take place on:

• Tuesday 24 May, 2pm to 4pm
• Wednesday 25 May, 2pm to 4pm

To book a place on these webinars, email [email protected]

Writing a good application

A good application:

• meets all the essential criteria, providing evidence where appropriate
• is concise and makes full use of the word limits available without exceeding them
• is relevant to and addresses the requirements of the Health and Wellbeing Fund and the VCSE HW Programme more widely
• outlines how you will achieve something and not just why

Supporting information

Applicants will need to provide the following:

• your charity number, or for non-charities, your company number
• a copy of the Memorandum and Articles of Association or constitution/governing document for organisations not established as charities
• your last year’s annual report and final accounts
• your organisation’s business plan, including financial forecasts for 2022 to 2025
• a project or programme budget, including a breakdown of costs
• confirmation that your organisation has equal opportunities, health and safety and safeguarding policies
• a staffing structure for your organisation – clearly showing the staff who will be working on the Health and Wellbeing Fund project or programme
• any evidence requested against specific criteria
• a complete risk assessment (template available)
• an exit plan (template available)
• a signed letter from a statutory provider. This should also include confirmation that:
• that the proposed project or programme is not currently being delivered anywhere in the locality
• that there is support for the project or programme proposed expansion or development

Note that successful applicants will need to accept the conditions of the grant award (see Annex 5). Any information provided is subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Notification of progress

You will be notified of the progress of your application using the email address on your application form. We aim to send you a notification in line with the following timeline, with final notifications being issued subject to DHSC business planning. If you have not received notification by 30 September 2022 then contact us. Unfortunately, we are unable to provide specific feedback about unsuccessful applications.

The final decision on successful applications will be subject to departmental business planning.

How to submit your application

Your application form and supporting documents should be sent via e-mail to [email protected] before 9am on 5 August 2022. Applications received after this time, even for circumstances beyond applicants’ control, will not be accepted.

Electronic copies of your annual report and final accounts, or links to your website and/or the Charity Commission website, are required. We are unable to accept hard copies of any documents at present.

The Health and Wellbeing Fund is a discretionary scheme, and as such there is no appeal process on decisions made. We do recognise that, on occasions, applicants may feel that the application process has not been followed correctly, and may wish to raise a concern accordingly. We will treat these concerns as informal complaints, which will be handled in line with our complaints procedure outlined in Annex 4.

Annex 1: work and health policy context

Women’s health strategy.

On 8 March 2021, the government announced plans to develop a Women’s Health Strategy, with the first phase being the launch of a call for evidence, which ran from March 2021 to June 2021.

The call for evidence had 3 components:

• a ‘Women’s Health – Let’s talk about it’ public survey, which was open to all individuals aged 16 and over in England
• an open invitation for individuals and organisations with expertise in women’s health to submit written evidence
• a focus group study with women across England, undertaken by the University of York in collaboration with the King’s Fund

The call for evidence was based around a number of key themes, one of which was ‘health in the workplace’. The call for evidence asked about a range of workplace issues, including comfort discussing health issues at work, how health issues/ conditions impacted experience in the workplace, and what forms of workplace support had, or would have, been helpful.

Results of the call for evidence public survey and written submissions can be found on the consultation response web page.

Results of the focus groups can be found on the PREPARE website.

In December 2021 DHSC published Our Vision for the Women’s Health Strategy for England . This sets out the ambitions for the strategy, based around 5 key themes, one of which is health in the workplace.

The next step is to develop and publish the full strategy in 2022.

Key findings

Key findings from the call for evidence public survey were:

• overall, 35% of women felt (or were perceived to feel) comfortable talking about health issues with their workplace; 58% said they felt uncomfortable; and 7% said they were not sure how they felt
• overall, 53% of women felt (or were perceived to feel) that their current or previous workplace had been supportive with regards to health issues; 27% said their workplace had been unsupportive; while 20% said they don’t know

To understand women’s experiences of health issues at work, the public survey asked respondents what support has or would have helped them to reach their full potential. The examples provided fell within 3 core themes.

Joint Work and Health Unit ( WHU )

In recognition of the strong two-way relationship between work and health, in 2015 the Joint Work and Health Unit ( WHU ) was established as a joint Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and DHSC initiative. The unit leads the government’s strategy to supporting working age disabled people, or people with long term health conditions, enter and stay in employment.

Relationship between work, health and women

We know that good work is good for health, however some people face additional barriers. From the period of October to December 2021:

• 14.2 million (34%) people aged 16 to 64 in the UK had a long-term health condition
• 8.8 million (21%) people aged 16 to 64 in the UK had a disability
• 5 in 10 disabled people were in employment compared with 8 in 10 non-disabled people

Around 140 million working days were lost to sickness absence in 2019. Over the course of a year, around 1.4 million working age people have at least one long-term sickness absence lasting 4 weeks or longer each year. The longer a sickness absence persists, the more complex the barriers become and the likelihood of a return falls [footnote 2] .

Roughly 100,000 people leave work each year following a long-term sickness absence.

Being out of work leads to poorer health outcomes, and once out of work, it becomes much more difficult for people to return to work [footnote 3] .

The women’s health call for evidence analytical report showed that only 1 in 3 respondents said they feel comfortable talking about health issues in their workplace (35%), and only 1 in 2 said their current or previous workplace had been supportive with regards to health issues (53%).

Of those who said a health condition or disability had impacted their experience in the workplace (62%) more than 3 in 4 said it had increased their stress levels (76%), and 2 in 3 said it had impacted their mental health (67%). It was also found that:

• 26% said it impacted their earnings
• 25% said it affected their opportunities for promotion
• 22% said it meant they stopped work earlier than they had planned

Unlike pregnancy or maternity, the menopause is not well understood or provided for in workplace cultures, policies and training. Managers’ and colleagues’ attitudes to women experiencing the menopause make a difference here. A lack of knowledge, understanding and support can create challenges for working women experiencing menopause transition in addition to coping with their symptoms. Combined with the variations in experiences discussed above, this forms the basis for a social responsibility case for greater organisational attention to menopause transition, in order to ensure women have the highest possible quality of working life.

We know from the Women’s Health call for evidence that menopause was just one of the most commonly cited reproductive health and employment issues being experienced.

Other issues were menstrual health/gynaecological conditions in the workplace such as endometriosis. Miscarriage and pregnancy loss also featured frequently in the call for evidence. The Lancet published a series of papers in April 2021, which described the prevalence and impact of miscarriage, highlighting that the short-term national economic cost of miscarriage is estimated to be £471 million per year in the UK.

The focus of this fund on the broader theme of women’s reproductive wellbeing in the workplace will align with the Women’s Health Strategy aims for health in the workplace:

• women feel supported in the workplace, and that taboos are broken down through open conversation

Further reading

Menopause transition: effects on women’s economic participation .

Annex 2: Charities Act

Section 70 of the charities act 2006 eligibility criteria.

The following is a summary of the criteria set out in Section 70 of the Charities Act 2006.

To be eligible to apply to the Health and Wellbeing Fund, your organisation must be a charity or institution (other than a charity) established for charitable, benevolent or philanthropic purposes.

The Act gives the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care the power to award grants to any charitable, benevolent or philanthropic institution in respect of any of the institution’s activities which directly or indirectly benefit the whole or any part of England.

For the purposes of law, a charitable organisation must demonstrate that it serves the public interest.

Activities should benefit the whole or part of England.

Where an organisation is not a charity, we would need to see their specific governing documents to ensure that they legally fulfil the required criteria.

Annex 3: eligible and ineligible expenditure

Eligible expenditure.

All eligible expenditure must be claimed net of VAT and is recoverable from HM Revenue and Customs.

The following costs/payments will be classified as eligible expenditure if made for the purposes of the funded activity:

• fees charged or to be charged to the grant recipient by the external auditors or accountants for reporting or certifying that the grant paid was applied for its intended purposes
• giving evidence to parliamentary select committees
• attending meetings with ministers or civil servants to discuss the progress of a taxpayer funded grant scheme
• responding to public consultations, where the topic is relevant to the objectives of the grant scheme. This does not include spending government grant funds on lobbying other people to respond to the consultation
• providing independent, evidence-based policy recommendations to local government, departments or ministers, where that is the objective of a taxpayer funded grant scheme, for example, ‘What Works Centres’
• providing independent evidence-based advice to local or national government as part of the general policy debate, where that is in line with the objectives of the grant scheme

A payment is defined as taking place at the moment when money passes out of grant recipient control. This may take place when:

• legal tender is passed to a supplier (or, for wages, to an employee)
• a letter is posted to a supplier or employee containing a cheque
• an electronic instruction is sent to a bank/building society to make a payment to a supplier or employee by direct credit or bank transfer

The grant recipient must not deliberately incur liabilities for eligible expenditure in advance of need; nor pay for eligible expenditure sooner than the due date for payment.

Ineligible expenditure

The following costs must be excluded from eligible expenditure. The list below does not override activities, which are deemed eligible in these conditions:

• paid for lobbying, which means using grant funds to fund lobbying (via an external firm or in-house staff) to undertake activities intended to influence or attempt to influence parliament, government or political activity; or attempting to influence legislative or regulatory action
• using grant funds to directly enable one part of government to challenge another on topics unrelated to the agreed purpose of the grant
• using grant funding to petition for additional funding
• expenses such as for entertaining, specifically aimed at exerting undue influence to change government policy
• input VAT reclaimable by the grant recipient from HMRC
• payments for activities of a political or exclusively religious nature

Other examples of expenditure which is prohibited include the following:

• contributions in kind
• interest payments or service charge payments for finance leases
• statutory fines, criminal fines or penalties civil penalties, damages or any associated legal costs
• payments for works or activities which the grant recipient, or any member of their Partnership, has a statutory duty to undertake, or that are fully funded by other sources
• bad debts to related parties
• payments for unfair dismissal or other compensation
• depreciation, amortisation or impairment of assets owned by the grant recipient
• the acquisition or improvement of assets by the grant recipient (unless the grant is explicitly for capital use – this will be stipulated in the grant funding letter)
• liabilities incurred before the commencement of the grant funding agreement unless agreed in writing by the authority

Annex 4: complaints procedure

The Health and Wellbeing Fund is a discretionary scheme, and as such there is no appeal process on decisions made by ministers. We do recognise that, on occasions, applicants may feel that the application process has not been followed correctly, and may wish to raise a concern accordingly. We will treat these concerns as informal complaints, which will be handled in line with our complaints procedure detailed below.

The first stage of the complaints process is initiated when someone indicates that they wish to complain. The complaint should be investigated and responded to by the team leader of the individual or team that has been named in the complaint. If the complaint is received by the Ministerial Correspondence and Public Enquiries Unit (MCPE), the complaints manager will forward it on to the relevant team leader. The target for Stage 1 response is 20 working days. The complaints manager can advise teams on their response, and should be copied in so that a record can be kept centrally.

The Voluntary Sector Health and Wellbeing Programme Engagement Team will handle complaints at this stage.

The second stage of the complaints process is initiated if, after having received a Stage 1 response, the complainant is still unhappy. At this stage, the complaint will be escalated to the deputy director or Grade 6 of the team that has been named in the complaint, and they will investigate and respond. The target for Stage 2 response is 20 working days. The complaints manager can advise on the response and should be copied in so that a record can be kept centrally.

The Voluntary Sector Health and Wellbeing Programme Engagement Team will escalate complaints to respective seniors at this stage of the process.

The third stage of the complaints process is initiated if, after having received a Stage 2 response, the complainant is still unhappy. At this stage, the complaint will be allocated to a Grade 6 or deputy director independent of the team that has been named in the complaint, and they will investigate and respond. The target for Stage 3 response is 20 working days. The complaints manager can advise on the response, and should be copied in so that a record can be kept centrally.

The Voluntary Sector Health and Wellbeing Programme Engagement Team should continue to be engaged at this stage of the process, and will engage with respective colleagues internally to comply with the Stage 3 processes.

Escalation to Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman

If after exhausting the 3 internal stages the complainant is still unhappy, they can escalate their complaint to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman ( PHSO ). All DHSC replies to complaints must include details of escalation procedures to bring complaints to the attention of the PHSO . The following text should be used at the end of the letter:

This concludes the department’s complaints process.

If you are not satisfied with the way the department has handled your complaint, you can ask the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman to review the case. You will need to ask your MP to do this for you.’

This is a summary of our complaints procedure .

Annex 5: summary of conditions of the award

If you are successful you will be sent a grant agreement letter, which will reflect principles outlined in the Compact funding and procurement code, detailing the full terms and conditions of the grant. Some of the terms you may wish to know in advance are:

• the terms and conditions must be accepted by a board member – trustee or director – or the chair of the management committee if you are an unincorporated association
• grants are restricted funds
• the grant is recoverable if you do not use it for the purposes intended, including if you do not fully spend it
• funding for all future financial years of the award is indicative, subject to annual departmental business planning and cannot be guaranteed
• there is no automatic right of carry forward, and funds unspent at the end of each financial year should be returned to the department by default
• the intention is to fund the proposed activity, however there is no commitment to funding the maximum amount awarded if this is not required
• the grant may not be passed to a third party
• there is no commitment to any funding after the agreed term of the grant
• the grant must be identified in your accounts as being from DHSC

If successful a trustee or director will be asked to sign a statement of grant usage which will confirm that the grant will not be used to fund the following activities:

• paid for lobbying, for example, using grant funds to fund lobbying (via an external firm or in-house staff) to undertake activities intended to influence or attempt to influence parliament, government or political activity; or attempting to influence legislative or regulatory action
• expenses such as for entertaining, specifically aimed at exerting undue influence to change government policy; input VAT reclaimable by the grant recipient from HMRC

Minimum reporting requirements have been identified for funded schemes. Successful organisations will need to agree to these monitoring and reporting arrangements at the outset, which will align to the Cabinet Office Functional Standards. Organisations who do not meet these requirements may risk having future grant payments withheld.

DWP Social Cost-Benefit Analysis Framework, 2010   ↩

Health at Work – an independent review of sickness absence, 2011   ↩

Personal and economic well-being: what matters most to our life satisfaction? ONS, 2019   ↩

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