Blood and Transplant Research Unit in Organ Donation and Transplantation

This application for a new National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Blood and Transplant Research Unit (BTRU) comes from the universities of Cambridge and Newcastle in partnership with NHS Blood and Transplant and our patient and public panel.

The BTRU will bring together doctors, nurses, scientists and healthcare researchers to conduct world-leading research in organ donation and transplantation. Our BTRU will involve the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle and Addenbrooke s and the Royal Papworth Hospital in Cambridge.

These hospitals have experience across the entire range of organ transplantation (heart, lung, liver, kidney and multi-organ transplants).

The aims of the BTRU are to increase the number of organs available, improve long-term outcomes and improve quality of life after transplant.

A major focus is to identify those who are not best served by current services and to improve access to transplantation and high-quality care for everyone, irrespective of social status or ethnicity. Public and Patient Involvement (PPI) is embedded throughout the BTRU. We have a lay co-applicant and lay representation on the Management Group and the Independent Steering Group.

We will ensure diversity among the PPI research panel and establish strong links to community groups to widen participation.

Our research plan builds on the present BTRU and addresses the priorities set out in the NHSBT plan for Organ Transplantation 2030.

The BTRU structure comprises 6 expert-led research themes: Theme 1 tests how modern perfusion machines, that keep organs alive outside the body, can increase the quality of organs available.

This will allow us to deliver new treatments to organs before transplantation and identify the best national system for delivering organ perfusion.

Theme 2 aims to increase use of organs by improving tissue-matching to enable transplants in difficult to match patients including women, those needing a re-transplant and ethnic minority groups.

Theme 3 aims to improve how long transplanted organs last and to improve recipients heart health, so they live longer with a working transplant.

Theme 4 will use information in NHSBT s national computer to test whether our research makes a difference and help design better services that improve access and patient survival.

Theme 5 will use cutting-edge technology to measure genes and proteins in donor organs to predict long-term individual outcomes.

Theme 6 will take the views of transplant patients and carers to identify the best ways of describing quality of life after transplantation. This will be invaluable in researching changes in practice that improve quality of life.

Our goal for the BTRU research outlined here is to deliver a step change in our understanding of how best to deliver transplant services to the UK population, ensuring more people get the transplants they need and go on to live healthy and fulfilling lives.