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TMRP DTP Studentships

Applications for October 2025 are now open

 

Are you interested in medical research that matters to patients and the NHS?

The MRC-NIHR Trials Methodology Research Partnership (TMRP) aims to Improve health by improving trials. Our MRC Doctoral Training Partnership presents an opportunity to undertake training for a PhD in trials methodology.

We will advertise upcoming projects in various areas including statistics, data analytics and informatics, computer science, health economics, qualitative methods, mixed-methods, clinical medicine and psychology.

 

Professional development training and support

Students will become members of the TMRP, offering a broader spectrum of training activities and networking opportunities beyond their host Research Organisation. Students will be encouraged to join relevant TMRP working groups, where they will meet other PhD students, post-doctoral researchers and senior academic staff from relevant and complementary research themes. In addition to a structured ‘core’ training programme, we are able to provide a range of more specific training that students may choose to attend following consultation with their supervisors.

Our Associate Partner Research Organisations are able to offer opportunities for students that will include: research visits; internships with industry, regulatory bodies and clinical trials units; engagement with health professional and other research networks. We will encourage and support DTP students to apply for international internship schemes such as the UKRI UK-Canada Globalink Doctoral Exchange Scheme.

Below you will find the project advertisements from our 12 partner institutions. The links will take you through to a full description of the project, including details of the full supervisory team. For more guidance on how to apply, including the application form and further details, see How To Apply.

University of Aberdeen

Investigating statistical methods to assess the conduct and integrity of clinical trials.

Integration of qualitative and quantitative data sets within clinical trials: development of good practice recommendations for relevant parties involved in designing and implementing RCTs.

Evaluation of Crowdsourcing Use for Inclusive and Diverse PPI Engagement in Clinical Trials. 

Bangor University

Value of funding research that is substantially comparable to a previously failed randomised controlled trial in terms of the question being addressed (PHOENIX).

How should the environmental impact of medicines be considered in the context of trial outcomes?

Developing linked pharmacometric-pharmacoeconomic analyses to inform clinical trial design.

University of Birmingham

A methodological framework for incorporating multiple outcomes into hybrid implementation and effectiveness trials.

University of Cambridge

Integrating the Design and Analysis of Randomised Controlled Trials and Observational Cohort Studies for Alzheimer’s Dementia Research.

Designs for sequences of early phase (modular) studies.

Operationally feasible Multi-Arm-Bandit Response Adaptive Trials.

University of Glasgow

Making trials more equity focused for minority ethnic people: Assessing differential treatment effectiveness and under-inclusion.

Statistical analysis of time to event data with incomplete event status.

Optimising allocation ratios in platform trials: role of simulation

Institute of Cancer Research (ICR)

Evaluating the Critical Role of Patient-Reported Outcomes in Assessing Cancer Treatment Tolerability.

Patient & public involvement (PPI) in the selection of trial endpoints in late phase adult cancer clinical trials.

University of Leeds

Programmes of cluster-randomised trials for optimising learning healthcare systems.

Implementation of optimisation trials of complex health and social care interventions.

When Trials Fall Short of Answering Their Research Question: Exploring the Consequences and Next Steps in Health Research: A Mixed Method Investigation.

University of Liverpool

Using Machine Learning approaches within causal inference approaches to make methods more efficient.

Integrating patient-reported data from multiple sources into registries and research databases for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

iCASE: Natural Language Processing for Outcome Detection in Clinical Narrative Text.

Newcastle University

Advancing inclusivity in child health trials: investigating recruitment, retention and communication methods.

Overcoming complexities in design and analysis of multi-arm clinical trials.

Data linkage and analysis without a unique identifier in clinical trials.

Identifying and validating digital biomarkers of frailty in Parkinson’s disease.

University of Plymouth

Modelling multiple ordinal outcomes in clinical trials.

Optimising participant recruitment in trials of rehabilitation interventions involving people living with a neurological condition and low levels of activation.

Longitudinal analysis to explore the long-term changes in Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patient reported outcome measures.

Queen Mary University London (QMUL)

Optimal design for the next generation of stepped wedge trials.

Tackling important (but hard to fund) questions in bowel disease: designing routine care Decision Architecture Randomised Trials (DARTs).

Pilot and feasibility studies for online clinical trials.

Collecting data to monitor and improve inclusivity.

University College London (UCL)

Improving Design and Analysis of Non-Inferiority Trials with sparse outcome data.

Improving the evaluation and implementation of treatments for heavy menstrual bleeding: a mixed methods approach.