Mental Health Research Leaders Award (United Kingdom)

The Higher Education Institutions (HEI) with little to no existing capacity will act as lead applicant, and should apply in collaboration with at least one ‘established’ partner(s) HEI(s) based in England.

The overall objective of this collaboration is to support the lead institution to develop an applied mental health research team, including the appointment and development of a senior researcher to lead the team, and to develop the institution’s research capacity with a view to applying for further grant funding as the team becomes more established.

Funding Information

• MHLAs can be for up to £2.5 million over a period of up to five years. The five year term of the award is sufficient to aid recruitment and retention of an applied mental health research team, but MHLAs will be encouraged to develop a proposal within 12-24 months to graduate to the full MHRG award. MHLAs which successfully apply to the MHRG scheme will be supported in their transition between awards; MHLAs which unsuccessfully apply to the MHRG scheme will still have their original MHLA award term and funding agreement honoured.
• MHLA applications will be expected to include well-developed plans for the first 2 years of the MHLA work programme along with outline objectives for years 3-5. Detailed plans for years 3-5 should be developed after commencement of the award and submitted to the NIHR for review and approval at an agreed date.

Expectations

• The MHLA programme is aimed at HEIs with limited applied mental health research capacity and those with no existing applied MH research capacity, wishing to expand their capacity and are situated within, or within easy reach of, “target areas”.
• Successful Lead applicant HEIs to the MHLA will be responsible for recruitment of a Leader and associated research team. The award is expected to support at least three new research posts (professor/reader/senior lecturer, post doctoral, post graduate) together with public partnership and research inclusion activities.
• Once appointed, the primary focus of the Leader will be to create and lead a team to co-develop or further refine the capacity building and research plans the Lead HEI originally applied with. Key areas of work may include research into evidence gaps, local mental health priorities and service delivery challenges, and building relevant academic and local organisation collaborations, which will then inform future funding applications, potentially including an MHRG application.
• Leaders will be a part of the NIHR Academy and will benefit from the support and development activities offered, but will also be expected to have a well-developed training/mentorship plan proposed as part of the application.
• Whilst there is no formal expectation or guarantee that recipients of a MHLA will be successful in obtaining a subsequent Group award, and all proposals for the Group award will be judged on their own merits, the aim of this scheme is to facilitate the long term development of MHRGs in the target areas.

MHLA-specific criteria

• While remaining flexible, they anticipate supporting applications that:
  • include research partnerships with a clear, shared ambition to address the challenges faced by people in areas historically under-served by applied mental health research.
  • propose a coherent and sustainable plan for capacity and capability strengthening at individual and institutional level, and include a trajectory for establishing a pipeline of future leaders within applied mental health research within the target areas
    • Individuals whose academic career development is being supported through NIHR MHLA funding can benefit from NIHR Academy membership and the support and development activities offered as part of this.
  • demonstrate the strength of institutional commitment from both the Lead and supporting HEI to the research partnership, and to sustained research capacity strengthening beyond the lifetime of the award.
  • Demonstrate developed and considered mentorship arrangements and plans which will meet the needs of the Leader, the Lead HEI and target area, and which are supported and contributed to by the Lead HEI and supporting institutions
  • address issues of inclusivity around sex, gender, age, ethnicity, social barriers to health and economic impact, specific to the target area’s context, when formulating research questions and research plans.
  • propose a coherent plan for engagement with the local community and people with lived experience of mental health problems, demonstrating the ways they will help inform the design and conduct of the research, with an emphasis on co-production.
  • include relevant engagement with policy makers, local communities, service users/patients, carers and the public, civil society organisations, and charities over the lifetime of the award.
  • include plans for knowledge mobilisation and dissemination to relevant stakeholders in the target area.
  • support and embed bi-directional learning between partner institutions and collaborating organisations within the target geographical area.
  • demonstrate plans for embedded and continuous evaluation of the work streams within the proposal.

Eligibility Criteria

• The HEI with no/limited capacity will act as lead applicant for MHLA applications and should clearly be in overall control of the research and capacity building strategies of the collaboration.
• HEIs with an existing track record or significant portfolio of applied mental health research will not be eligible to apply for this award as a lead applicant. However, they would be expected to work collaboratively and utilise their experience and infrastructure to support the less experienced HEI. It will be permissible to involve more than two HEIs in the collaborative bid, where appropriate.
• Suitability as either a ‘Lead’ or ‘Established’ partner will depend on the HEI’s existing capacity and experience within applied mental health research. Applicants will be asked to provide evidence of their relative research capacity and capability to justify being considered either a ‘Lead’ or ‘Established’ partner, within the spirit of the intended outcomes of this funding scheme (further details on the information required will be provided in the Application Guidance). As an example, an ‘Established’ partner would be considered as one known in the research community to be an effective ‘net exporter’ of mental health research of benefit to the UK public.

Ineligibility Criteria

• Mental Health Research Leaders Awards will NOT support applications which:
  • do not meet the published call criteria for the Mental Health Research Leaders Award.
  • are led, or clearly directed, by institutions with a pre-existing substantial applied mental health research portfolio.
  • do not include a clear collaborative partnership led by a HEI with limited applied mental health research capacity in collaboration with at least one HEI with a substantial applied mental health research capability.
  • are not clearly expanding the applied mental health research capability/capacity of the lead HEI to deliver applied mental health research pertinent to the target area in a sustainable manner.
  • include basic laboratory/discovery research, experimental medicine or research involving animals.
  • consist solely of one of the following:
    • large single randomised clinical trials (RCTs) of interventions; any RCT must be part of a wider cohesive programme of research and capacity development work
    • epidemiological studies
    • evidence synthesis (e.g., systematic reviews)
    • evaluations of existing services, where the programme of work does not include evidence-based development and improvement of these services
    • dissemination
    • establishing new patient cohorts, biobanks or bio-sample collections or data collection studies (samples or data from existing biobanks, patient registries cohorts may be used)

For more information, visit NIHR.