Three research project types are accepted:
- research in:
- human subjects, populations and communities and laboratory research
- epidemiology
- field research
- medical education
- audit
- systematic review
Additional project formats may be considered provided they meet the Advanced Training Research Project (ATRP) guidelines and marking criteria. Trainees and supervisors seeking additional format approval need to provide justification as to how the project submission meets the criteria.
Research in human subjects, populations and communities or laboratory research
This project type also includes epidemiology, field research and medical education research.
Step-by-step: Research in human subjects, populations and communities or laboratory research
1. General preparation
- Identify a supervisor and review the ATRP guidelines.
- Develop skills in scientific writing to apply for grant support, publish scientific and medical papers.
2. Identify the problem and formulate research questions
- Consider and define a health-related problem.
- Review, analyse and synthesise evidence related to the existing literature, or your current practice, to identify research gaps and formulate research questions or hypotheses.
3. Develop the research design
- Convert information needs into answerable questions and clearly identify the specific aims of a study designed to address the question.
- Identify an appropriate research method and techniques.
- Identify the ethical issues arising from conduct of the study.
- Obtain ethics approval from the appropriate body, if required.
4. Collect or identify data to achieve the study objectives
- Apply quantitative or qualitative methods.
5. Write up research
- Appraise and synthesise the research findings in consideration of the research objectives and hypotheses.
- Set findings within the context of the wider literature on the topic.
- Apply the results of the study to practice.
- Demonstrate effective and succinct written communication.
- Outline how research should and could contribute to the practice of evidence-based medicine.
- Assess strengths, weaknesses and limitations of the research project.
- Reference using a consistent style.
6. Self-reflection
- Evaluate your performance.
- Discuss your performance with your supervisor – consider any issues that arose during the research project and how the findings might change your practice.
Audit
An audit project aims to assess, evaluate and improve the quality of healthcare through the systematic review of practice. A specific component of practice to be reviewed is identified and local performance is assessed against specific criteria in relation to the gold standard.
An audit will identify substandard areas and develop recommendations for implementation, based on a succinct review of the literature. The audit should then be repeated to assess the success of the interventions.
If a repeated audit isn’t possible due to time constraints, then a plan for implementing, measuring and sustaining improvements must be presented.
Your audit should be of an area of interest to you. Look at opportunities to audit a novel project or program within your training setting.
The size of your audit is dependent on the topic and nature of the audit undertaken. The presentation of the audit must adhere to the standards for presentation of research, including the suggested word count.
You must demonstrate a clear understanding of the audit cycle, with evidence of how your work will lead to an improvement in clinical practice.
Step-by-step: Audit
Follow the paradigm of ‘joined-up research’, which begins by assessing a problem, moving on to implementing change and completing the circle by evaluating change over an appropriate period.
1. Identify a topic that is important to audit.
2. Review the literature and other relevant information to determine standards against which to audit.
3. Develop audit criteria that will measure performance against the agreed standard.
4. Collect and analyse data and report results.
5. Reflect on results and develop improvement plan.
6. Implement improvement plan.
7. Repeat data collection to measure improvement.
Systematic review
A systematic review is a method of critically appraising bodies of research studies with a high level of rigour. Systematic reviews are different to narrative reviews and expert commentaries because they use a well-defined protocol to ensure high coverage of all relevant information and can be replicated easily. A standard, published protocol, such as the PRISMA guidelines could be used.
For ATRPs, the systematic review should be conducted in an area of relevance of your practice.
Step-by-step: Systematic review
1. Define the review question and rationale behind question.
2. Develop inclusion and exclusion criteria for including studies, search for studies and explain search syntax, define search strategy – for example a brief description of PICO, identify and defend databases searched.
3. Assess study quality.
4. Select studies and collect data.
5. Assess risk of bias of included studies.
6. Analyse data.
7. Interpret results and draw conclusions.
Resources
RACP Online Learning Resource: Research Project