Primary Care Research Team Assessment

Ely Bridge Surgery in Cardiff has been accredited by the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) for its high quality research work in general practice.  The accreditation - Primary Care Research Team Assessment (PCRTA) Collaborator Research Practice - recognises the highest standards achieved in the conduct of research in a General Practice setting.  Ely Bridge practice is one of just twelve GP practices to receive accreditation and the first practice in Wales to do so.    There are five other practices in Wales working towards achieving Collaborator Research Practice accreditation.

The PCRTA is a voluntary scheme designed to assess and recognise the quality of primary care research undertaken within general practice against professionally developed and tested standards and criteria.  Accreditation provides practices with a ‘kite mark’ of quality after the practice has been assessed on seven areas of activity including practice organisation and the involvement of patients.  It comprises a rigorous assessment entailing the submission of written evidence followed by a practice visit by a team of assessors.  The accreditation process takes up to eighteen months to complete and focuses on the research infrastructure of individual GP practices and their teams. 

The assessment team for Ely Bridge practice were very impressed by presentation of comprehensive data supplied by the practice team represented by Mel Davies (Research Manager), Dr Peter Edwards, Dr Huw Charles and Nicola Gardner (Practice Manager).  They found good communication networks were in place to ensure that all the Primary Health Care Team were aware of research in progress and were actively involved in the process of reviewing its impact on the practice.  Work undertaken in conjunction with the College of Medicine, University of Wales on the development of care pathways for patients with COPD was particularly innovative.  Research Governance arrangements in place were excellent.  The practice showed diversity in approach to research having academic research links with Cardiff and Swansea Universities and pharmaceutical trials.  Both internal and external publication and dissemination of work takes place at Ely Bridge.  The practice’s recent interaction with other research practices in the area was described as innovative and seen to be very proactive.

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