Funding for research

A fellowship means you can take time out of your substantive job role or training programme to complete a research project and develop your research skills.

Our fellowships are for you to collect sufficient pilot data to make you a strong PhD candidate, or for you to undertake further research and develop a proposal for an NIHR-supported clinical lecturer/senior lecturer post or similar award.

Our fellowships provide the funding for your salary and related research expenses. Your substantive position will need to be back-filled, or if you’re a doctor, you’ll need to arrange to be out-of-programme.

We offer two types of fellowship:

• Pre-Doctoral Research Fellowships
  
  These fellowships are for people who haven’t completed a PhD. You can apply if you’re a medic or healthcare professional outside of medicine (for example, a nurse, midwife, allied health professional, pharmacist, research practitioner, psychologist or health scientist).
   
• Post-Doctoral Research Fellowships
  
  These fellowships are for people who have completed a PhD in the past five years.

For both fellowships, you need to be a UK resident and have the legal right to work in the UK.

Please read the detailed criteria and eligibility section in our Guidance Notes that you can download before you apply.

We know that working arrangements can be complicated, so we can assess your eligibility on a case-by-case basis. If you have any queries, please contact us at grants@imperialcharity.org.uk.

You can apply for up to £85,000 to cover your salary and relevant research expenses.

Our Guidance Notes provide further detail about costs that you can/cannot include.

If your current salary exceeds the maximum threshold, please contact us at grants@imperialcharity.org.uk.

This depends if you’re doing a pre-doctoral or a post-doctoral fellowship. You can read our Guidance Notes for further information.

We’re committed to supporting pioneering research as well as the training and development of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust staff. You’ll be asked to identify an important research question that will have an impact on patient care at ICHT, its surrounding communities and the wider NHS.

We’re looking for applicants who will be able to use the academic research skills they will develop, as well as data produced in their research project, to springboard into further study or academic research career.

You can read our Guidance Notes for more information about our assessment criteria.

To find out more about the fellows and projects we've previously supported, click here.

Your application needs the support of a supervisor(s) with relevant academic research and professional background, as well as your line manager and your Divisional Research Manager. This ensures that you have the support to make your proposal competitive, and to ensure your current role is back-filled (or if you're a medic, that your out-of-programme request can be arranged).

Please complete the application form on our online grants portal Flexigrant. You'll need to register for a Flexigrant account if you don’t have one already.

Please make sure you use your ICHT contact details and nhs.net email when you register. Then, when you log in, you can submit a new application under the ‘My applications’ tab on the left-hand side.

Applications open once a year.

• Applications are now open on Flexigrant 

• Applications will close at 12noon on Thursday 1 February 2024

• We will inform you of the outcome of your application by mid-June 2024.

We've created lots of resources to help you with your application. 

• Click here to see the Pre-Doc Fellowship Guidance Notes
• Click here to see the Pre-Doc Fellowship Sample Application Form
• Click here to see the Post-Doc Fellowship Guidance Notes
• Click here to see the Post-Doc Fellowship Sample Application Form​​​​​

For further support, we recommend you reach out to the following key contacts:

• If you work in Nursing and Midwifery: Professor Mary Wells, Lead Nurse for Research mary.wells5@nhs.net
• If you're a medic: Professor Jeremy Levy,  Director of Clinical Academic Training cato@imperial.ac.uk 

• If you’re an allied health professional: Dr Caroline Alexander, Lead Clinical Academic for Therapies caroline.alexander1@nhs.net

You must discuss your application with your relevant Divisional Research Managers who are here to help:

• Medicine and Integrated Care: Scott Mullaney scott.mullaney@nhs.net
• Surgery, Cancer and Cardiovascular​​​​​: Donna Copeland  donna.copeland@nhs.net
• Women’s, cardiac, clinical support, sexual health: Ella Johnson ella.johnson@nhs.net

The Clinical Academic Training Office (CATO) runs an annual series of events to support applicants for research funding, including ‘Preparing for a pre-doctoral application’ and ‘Academic opportunities for doctors’. Find out more here.

When planning to cost your fellowship, please make sure you read the Guidance Notes carefully. You cannot start your fellowship until after the Welcome event, usually held in July, and after you have back-filled your substantive post at ICHT or if you’re a doctor, you have secured your out-of-programme arrangements.

Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust or Imperial College London will pay your salary - and any other approved costs - upfront. They will then invoice us quarterly and we will repay them.