Professor Caroline Alexander on her role as Lead Clinical Academic for Allied Health Professionals

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By Maxine Myers January 24, 2025

Musculoskeletal expert Professor Caroline Alexander has stepped down from her role as Lead Clinical Academic for Allied Health Professionals.

Professor Alexander was appointed to the post in 2017 to support allied health professionals at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust who want to do research. She retired at the end of 2024, following 37 years of service in the NHS.

Professor Alexander’s role sat within the Therapies Department but she was also a member of the Clinical Academic Training Office (CATO), which delivers research training and education opportunities for clinical staff as part of the Imperial College Academic Health Science Centre (AHSC).

The AHSC aims to accelerate the translation of scientific breakthroughs into new ways to improve patient care, educate students and enhance public health. It is a strategic partnership between Imperial College London, Imperial College Healthcare NHS TrustThe Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust,  Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and The Institute of Cancer Research, London.

Maxine Myers caught up with Professor Alexander to hear about her achievements as the first Lead Clinical Academic for Allied Health Professionals and what she will miss most about her role.

1. What are some of the changes you made as Lead Clinical Academic?

I would say the start of a career structure in the therapies department for clinical academics. We now have research champions, and junior clinical research rotations which give therapies staff the chance to be embedded with one of our fellows to support their research for one day per week for the length of their clinical rotation. We also have a couple of substantive senior clinical academic positions for speech and language therapy and for occupational therapy.

The structure we have developed enables clinicians to see that there is a career you can have mixing clinical work with research.

2. What are some of the challenges you faced?

A main challenge has been to develop the culture and appreciation of having clinical academics working in the NHS.

It can be challenging for managers to backfill clinical roles when staff take time away to do research. However, it has been valuable to hear managers talk of the importance and value of having clinical academics within their clinical teams and the impact they can have on clinical care.

We did a key piece of work asking some managers, clinical academics and patients what they thought were the impacts clinical academics make.

They described how clinical academics have a positive impact on clinical practice and staff development. Managers outlined how they give staff the support when doing service evaluations, audits and quality improvement projects as well as research. Having clinical academics also attracts good staff to the trust and helps to retain existing staff.

This information supports our managers when they help facilitate academic activity and allow staff to do fellowships and take up research opportunities at Imperial College London.

3. What have some of the highlights been?

A highlight for me is being part of people’s research career journeys. I have supervised staff who at first were wondering if research was for them and are now post-doctoral researchers.

I also hope that my own research into people with Hypermobility Spectrum Disorder – a condition that affects joints and ligaments – has made a difference to clinical practice.

4. Have you seen a change in the number of NHS staff doing clinical research?

I have seen increasing numbers of staff on the ground who are active in research and it shows others that this is a possible career direction. We are attracting people into the Trust because of our research reputation and opportunities to get involved in this work. I hope this can be replicated in other departments too.

5. Can you tell us about the development of the annual North West London Research Symposium? (This is an event for nurses, midwives, allied health professionals, healthcare scientists, pharmacy staff, psychologists and clinical research practitioners.)

It’s been great to see the development of the research symposium, which is organised by CATO. At the event staff have the opportunity to present their research and each year we get more and more submissions and the standard of the research has really grown.

It is great to see so many clinicians, research supervisors and managers coming to the event, whether that’s because they want to be researchers or because they want to support their staff or develop their understanding of research.

6. What more do you think needs to be done to increase the numbers of allied health professionals into research?

I think we need to establish a clinical academic structure from the earliest point in someone’s career into post-doctoral positions which allow these clinicians to contribute to care using both their clinical and research skills.

The NHS recognises that research is vital to better care but there is the challenge of funding clinical posts that have research time within them. We need to find how we can create more opportunities for staff to do research such as joint contracts with Imperial College London.

We need to think about how we support staff once they complete their research and then return to their original NHS post. Staff come back more skilled and knowledgeable, but we need to have a career structure in place for them to be able to use these skills and have a possibility of being promoted rather than becoming stuck at the same banding whilst they progress through research fellowship schemes.

7. What will you miss about your role?

I will miss the personal contact. I enjoyed working closely with Professor Mary Wells, who leads the development of clinical academic careers and research in nursing and midwifery, as well as working with the CATO team who have supported me in my endeavours. I will also miss the musculoskeletal physiotherapy team and the patients at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.