Research teams from hospital trusts across Shropshire, including the Gobowen's Orthopaedic Hospital, have been recognised for their collaborative work on a national Covid-19 study and West Midlands commercial Covid-19 Novavax vaccine trial.

The award from the Clinical Research Network West Midlands (CRN) is for the trusts' joint efforts to support the Public Health England study called SIREN and Novavax vaccine trial.

The SIREN study is looking at whether healthcare workers who are identified as having previously had Covid-19, detected by positive antibody tests, compared to those who do not have evidence of infection, are protected from future episodes of infection.

The findings from the year-long study will be used to help understand the future impact of Covid-19 on the population.

The Gobowen Orthopaedic Hospital is one of those hospitals whose teams helped with the research, much to the delight of Ruth Longfellow, consultant anaesthetist and associate medical director, and Teresa Jones, research manager at the hospital.

They said: "The SIREN Study has been a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate how, across our local health system, we can all work together incredibly effectively to achieve the same common goal – and this award is absolutely testament to that.

"We're proud of everybody from across the health and care system who has worked hard on the SIREN Study and we look forward to working together to deliver more studies in the future."

Meanwhile Dr Jane Povey, medical director at Shropshire Community Health NHS Trust, added: "One thing the Covid-19 pandemic has taught us is that we cannot beat it unless we all work together.

"Our research teams have demonstrated just this, by joining together to implement this important study across the four trusts.

“We are delighted that their hard work has been formally recognised by the presentation of this prestigious award."

Dave Evans, joint accountable officer at Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin CCGs, also added: "This is great recognition for the teams and for the NHS staff who are giving up their time to take part in this research to benefit patients.

“Well done and thank you to everyone involved."

Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust recruited 538 healthy volunteers to the Novavax vaccine study.

Since the SIREN study started in September this year, 570 patient facing staff from across the trusts have volunteered to take part, including doctors, nurses, allied health professionals, and support staff.