ABOUT US

Who We Are

The Psychosocial Oncology and Clinical Practice Research Group (POCPRG) is funded primarily by Cancer Research UK, the UK's leading charity dedicated to cancer research. We also receive funding from the National Cancer Research Institute and the Yorkshire Cancer Research Network.

We are based in the Cancer Research UK Clinical Centre in Leeds, which is part of the University of Leeds Faculty of Medicine and Health at St James's University Hospital. There are only five Cancer Research UK Clinical Centres in the UK, the other four being in London, Edinburgh and Oxford

We work with a variety of other people, locally, nationally and internationally.

In Leeds, we have links with the Clinical Trials and Research Unit (CTRU), the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Sciences and the Leeds Dental Institute. The CTRU at the University of Leeds is a cancer clinical trials unit accredited by the national Cancer Research Institute as having research excellence and the key competencies to manage cancer clinical trials in the modern research governance environment. The majority of its work is in cancer research and it has developed a special interest and expertise in Quality of Life research in clinical trials, methodology and clinical practice.

Nationally, we have established close links with the CRUK Psychological Medicine Research Group in Edinburgh and King's College London, as well as undertaking projects collaboratively with researchers elsewhere in the country.

The group leader also contributes to the design and support of projects abroad, mainly in Europe and the USA.

What we do

We have an active research program in psychosocial and clinical research and our main interest is in patient centred assessment in clinical practice - including evaluation of quality of life, psychosocial morbidity and social problems.

The main research focus of the Psychosocial Oncology and Clinical Practice Research Group (POCPRG) is on patient-centred assessment of symptoms and problems and the use of information in individual patient care. We approach this research area from the perspective of oncologists with direct access to large clinical practices, in collaboration with psychologists, psychiatrists, biomedical statisticians and epidemiologists from Leeds, elsewhere in the UK and abroad.

The hope is that the work we do in the group will lead to improvements in medical care and patient well-being during cancer treatment.

Following a successful five-yearly review and awarding of a five-year Programme Grant by Cancer Research UK, we will build on our existing work and develop it further. This falls into two main areas: adaptation of quality of life questionnaires to improve their ability to identify issues and training doctors how to interpret the results from the questionnaires and respond to them