
News Highlighting our key achievements one year on
One year ago, Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Liverpool officially announced the launch of a new groundbreaking partnership, the Mental Health Research for Innovation Centre (M-RIC). To mark a year since the official announcement, we have put together a gallery showing 12 key highlights over the past 12 months.
M-RIC was awarded £10.5 million of government funding through the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The funding is provided as part of the national Mental Health Mission which aims to accelerate mental health research through a UK network of leading investigators called the NIHR Mental Health Translational Research Collaboration.
Since the announcement, significant progress has been made in M-RIC’s six research work packages, in our partnerships across the public, third and private sectors and in our work to put the voice of service users and carers at the heart of our research teams.
Professor Iain Buchan, M-RIC Co-Director and Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor for Innovation at the University of Liverpool said:
“I am so proud of the M-RIC family for coming together across disciplines, organisations and lived experiences, and establishing a new connected mental health research centre in just one year. This has taken hard work and common passion to deliver new understanding of mental health – reaching beyond traditional academic psychiatry into community settings and across systems of mental and physical healthcare. This connected approach is data-hungry, so we have integrated the work of data scientists and engineers with that of mental health researchers and professionals, and crucially, with our service-users, carers and public advisers.
“One year on, M-RIC is delivering research for innovation, shaped by our communities, seamless between NHS and university partners and ready to implement new therapies and population health initiatives. This tight coupling of research and implementation also allows us to move from slow, linear translation to an aglile learning system. This will ensure that M-RIC has a lasting impact acting as a blueprint for change.”
Professor Nusrat Husain, M-RIC Co-Director and Director of Research and Innovation at Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust said:
“As we mark this important one year milestone, I want to express my profound gratitude to all our partners, staff, service users, and carers for their support and involvement. The Centre addresses a crucial need for Liverpool and the surrounding city region. The resilient community we serve has endured significant challenges, but is rich in lived experience, and it is only right that our Centre provides world leading mental health research with the funding it requires and deserves. It is encouraging to see the collaborative efforts of the NHS, industry and academia, as we begin to realise some of our ambitions and work towards our ultimate goal to eradicate disparities and ensuring no one is left behind in accessing excellent mental healthcare and treatments.”
Professor Joe Rafferty, Chief Executive of Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust said:
“I am enormously proud to see that M-RIC is moving at pace and making significant steps forward in traditionally under-researched areas such as early intervention in psychosis and difficult to treat depression. We are unashamedly bold and distinct in our approach; growing an army of staff and service users involved in research co-production in Mersey Care and M-RIC and exponentially increasing our opportunities to learn, innovate and improve. I want to lend my voice to congratulate all the staff, patients, carers and advocates for mental health research involved in M-RIC.”
12 key highlights from the last 12 months
Click on each image to view more about each highlight