Impacts of clinical academic activity: qualitative interviews with healthcare managers and research-active nurses, midwives, allied health professionals and pharmacists

OBJECTIVES: To explore the perceived impacts of clinical academic activity among the professions outside medicine. DESIGN: Qualitative semistructured interviews. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: There were two groups of interviewees: Research-active nurses, midwives, allied health professionals, healthcare scientists, psychologists and pharmacists (NMAHPPs) and managers of these professions. All participants were employed in a single, multisite healthcare organisation in the UK. ANALYSIS: Interview transcripts were analysed using the framework method to identify key themes, subthemes and areas of divergence. RESULTS: Four themes were identified. The first, cultural shifts, described the perceived improvements in the approach to patient care and research culture that were associated with clinical academic activity. The second theme explored visibility and included the positive reputation that clinical academics were identified as bringing to the organisation in contrast with perceived levels of invisibility and inaccessibility of these roles. The third theme identified the impacts of the clinical academic pathways, including the precarity of these roles. The final theme explored making impact tangible, and described interviewees’ suggestions of possible methods to record and demonstrate impact. CONCLUSIONS: Perceived positive impacts of NMAHPP clinical academic activity focused on interlinked positive changes for patients and clinical teams. This included delivery of evidence-based healthcare, patient involvement in clinical decision making and improved staff recruitment and retention. However, the positive impacts of clinical academic activity often centred around individual clinicians and did not necessarily translate throughout the organisation. The current clinical academic pathway was identified as causing tension between the perceived value of clinical academic activity and the need to find sufficient staffing to cover clinical services.