Job summary
- Main area
- Obstetrics and Gynaecology
- Grade
- NHS AfC: Band 5
- Contract
- Fixed term: 3 months (Potential to extend subject to charity funding)
- Hours
- Part time - 22.5 hours per week (Flexible working)
- Job ref
- 196-COF10818-S
- Employer
- Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust
- Employer type
- NHS
- Site
- St Thomas' Hospital
- Town
- London
- Salary
- £35,964 - £43,780 per annum incl. of HCA (pro rata)
- Salary period
- Yearly
- Closing
- 13/07/2025 23:59
Employer heading

Preterm Research Assistant
NHS AfC: Band 5
Guy’s and St Thomas’ is among the UK’s busiest and most successful NHS foundation trusts. We provide a full range of hospital and community services for people in south London and as well as specialist care for patients from further afield including cancer, renal, orthopaedic, respiratory and cardiovascular services.
Guy’s is home to the largest dental school in Europe and a £160 million Cancer Centre opened in 2016. As part of our commitment to provide care closer to home, in 2017 we also opened a cancer centre and a kidney treatment centre at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup. St Thomas’ has one of the largest critical care units in the UK and one of the busiest emergency departments in London. It is also home to Evelina London Children’s Hospital.
Evelina London cares for local children in Lambeth and Southwark and provides specialist services across south east England including cardiac, renal and critical care services. We lead a number of specialist service networks aiming to ensure children are treated locally where possible, but have access to specialist expertise when they need it. Our community services include health visiting, school nursing and support for families of children with long-term conditions.
Our adult community services teams deliver care at the heart of the local communities we serve, working in partnership with GPs, local authorities and other healthcare and voluntary sector organisations. Working with our partners in Lambeth and Southwark, we are focusing on new ways of working to improve care for local patients.
In February 2021 the Royal Brompton and Harefield joined Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, bringing together world-leading expertise in the care and research of heart and lung disease. Our merger provides a once in a generation opportunity to build a lasting, world-renowned heart and lung centre, providing the highest quality care for patients and conducting world-leading research.
We have a reputation for clinical excellence and high quality teaching and research. We are part of King’s Health Partners, one of eight accredited UK academic health sciences centres. In partnership with King’s College London we have dedicated clinical research facilities including an MHRA accredited Phase I clinical trials unit.
Patients are at the heart of everything we do and we pride ourselves on ensuring the best possible patient experience as well as safe, high quality care. We are proud to have one of the lowest mortality rates in the NHS. Following a comprehensive Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection in 2019 we maintained our overall rating of ‘good’. Our adult community services achieved a rating of ‘outstanding’.
The commitment of our 23,500 staff is key to our success. We are one of the largest local employers and we aim to develop and support all our staff so they are able to deliver high quality, safe and efficient care. The 2019 NHS staff survey results show that we have one of the most engaged and motivated workforces in the NHS. We know this has a positive impact on the care provided to our patients.
We have one of the most ambitious capital investment programmes anywhere in the NHS.
Job overview
Preterm birth remains the greatest contributor to neonatal mortality and morbidity in the UK. It has been demonstrated that women and babies from ethnic minorities are more likely to have poor outcomes. Similar findings have been demonstrated in adolescent mothers and women of low socio-demographic status. Our idea is to explore the barriers to accessing care and co-design a patient empowerment and staff education and program to improve equitable access and trust in hospital care for women presenting with symptoms of preterm labour and improve clinical management. We want to understand the data within GSTT hospital trust to understand the management of women with preterm birth as well as the perinatal outcomes to better understand the health inequalities in our population. Following this, patient and public involvement, with a specific focus on marginalised communities, including Black African, Caribbean and South Asian communities, and those living with socioeconomic deprivation is key to understand the reasons behind the poor outcomes in the context of preterm birth. We aim to better define the populations most at risk of preterm labour, the gap in optimal preterm optimisation in different ethnic and sociodemographic groups and explore the specific barriers and facilitators to receiving optimal hospital care in these communities, with a focus on access, trust and knowledge.
This post is a 0.80 WTE post for 3 months.
Main duties of the job
The postholder will work with a team of obstetricians, midwives and neonatal doctors at St Thomas’ hospital. You will be responsible for assisting in the first steps of this project including the baseline data collection and data analysis. The main scope of this role includes collecting retrospective local neonatal and maternal data of preterm deliveries over a 5 year period and stratifying this by demographic background. Basic clinical knowledge and data collection and data cleaning methods are required, support will be provided for any data analysis. You may also provide assistance in conducting literature reviews and drafting reports. You will may also assist in drafting and undergoing some qualitative interviews for staff and the public as well as analysing this.
Working for our organisation
As the only NHS Trust in London with women’s and specialist children’s services on one site we have unique opportunities to provide excellent, high-quality, integrated care for mothers, babies and children. Our directorate provides high quality care to patients across South East London, as well as delivering a range of specialist services both nationally and internationally. Alongside our clinical services, we are integrated with colleagues at Kings College London, delivering a significant programme of research and development.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
Key responsibilities:
Supporting the PRELUDE team with general organisation of the project
· Leading on prospective data collection from patient hospital records on the trust computers, collecting both maternal and neonatal data
· Developing data collections tools, questionnaires and semi-structured interview questions
· Conducting literature reviews and database searches
· Provides general administrative support to the project, including organising and attending meetings, capturing minutes and maintaining logs
· Contribute to production of research reports and publications
· Takes responsibility for managing workload to ensure timely delivery of projects
Person specification
Qualifications and Education
Essential criteria
- BSc or other undergraduate qualification awarded in Public Health, Epidemiology, Social Science, or related health discipline.
- Track record of significant continuous professional and management development
Desirable criteria
- MSc awarded in Public Health, Epidemiology, Social Science, or related health discipline.
Previous experience
Essential criteria
- Experience providing either administrative or research support.
- Experience in working as part of a busy multi-disciplinary team.
Desirable criteria
- Experience in working with communities from different sociodemographic background
- Experience using secure online databases for research
- Practical experience of conducting research
- Project management experience
Skills/ Knowledge/ Ability
Essential criteria
- Excellent verbal communication skills and the ability to work with a wide range of people
- Strong IT skills, especially MS Office software (MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Teams).
- Excellent written communication skills and the ability to write clearly and succinctly for publication
- Highly motivated and ability to work independently
- Ability to respond to changing demands, to use initiative and to work independently.
- Good project and time management skills.
Additional Information
Essential criteria
- Committed to equality, diversity and inclusion, actively addressing areas of potential bias.
- Willingness to work as part of a team and to be open-minded and cooperative
Desirable criteria
- Willingness to travel across south-east London to conduct community engagement work
Applicant requirements
The postholder will have access to vulnerable people in the course of their normal duties and as such this post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service to check for any previous criminal convictions.
Documents to download
Further details / informal visits contact
- Name
- Anastasia Martin
- Job title
- Academic Clinical Fellow
- Email address
- [email protected]
- Additional information
Alex Ridout
List jobs with Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust in Administrative Services or all sectors