Next up, we are thrilled to welcome Hywel Dda University Health Board to the growing EDGE Community!
We are delighted to announce that the EDGE Community continues to grow, with a new UK nation now represented. Please join us in welcoming Hywel Dda University Health Board from Wales to the EDGE Community!
By adopting the EDGE Programme, Hywel Dda University Health Board is demonstrating its commitment to strengthening research and innovation across the organisation. The programme will support their ambition to embed high-quality, impactful research into everyday practice, helping to drive continuous improvement and deliver meaningful benefits for patients, staff, and the wider communities they serve.
Strengthening research finance with EDGE
The team at Hywel Dda University Health Board is preparing to use EDGE to track study activity and make use of its finance tools. We recently caught up with Bethan Phillips, Lead Pharmacist for Research and Development at Hywel Dda University Health Board, to hear about what this implementation means for the team.
Bethan shared the following about the impact EDGE will have:
"The implementation of EDGE Research Management software will significantly enhance our ability to track research activity, streamline processes, and improve oversight across the research portfolio. By providing more accurate and timely data, EDGE will also support complete cost recovery, helping to ensure the long-term sustainability of research delivery across the organisation.”
Bethan also spoke about why this is such an exciting milestone for Hywel Dda:
“This comes at an exciting time for Hywel Dda as we expand our commercial research portfolio, helping to ensure that patients across our rural communities have access to the latest research opportunities and innovative treatments closer to home.”
Additionally, Chris Hopkins, Acting Director in R&D at Hywel Dda shared the following words post EDGE implementation:
"Research changes lives. It gives patients access to tomorrow’s treatments today, attracts world-leading collaborations, and helps us build a healthier future for the communities across our region. But great research also depends on great systems. The implementation of EDGE has been transformational for our R&D team, giving us the ability to accurately capture, manage and demonstrate the value of the research activity taking place across our organisation. What was once difficult to track can now be evidenced in real time, ensuring that every study visit, every intervention, and every contribution made by our research workforce is recognised.
The impact extends far beyond financial management. By using EDGE to capture the true scale of our research activity, we are strengthening the sustainability of our research infrastructure, creating opportunities for growth, attracting new commercial and academic partnerships, and enabling more patients across west Wales to participate in high-quality research studies. Every pound recovered through accurate activity tracking is a pound that can be reinvested into our people, our research capability and our future ambitions. It supports the next study, the next innovation, the next collaboration and, ultimately, the next patient whose life may be changed through research.
I am immensely proud of our R&D team for embracing this approach and demonstrating what value driven research looks like in practice. Their work shows that innovation is not only about discovering something new. It is about ensuring that we maximise every opportunity, every resource and every partnership to deliver the greatest possible benefit for our patients and communities. EDGE has become an important enabler of that vision, helping us turn research activity into measurable impact.”
Working together to unlock EDGE’s full potential
Jen Peach, EDGE Knowledge Team Manager, who delivered Hywel Dda’s EDGE training, shares the following welcome message to the team:
“We are delighted to welcome Hywel Dda University Health Board to the EDGE community. Their arrival is a significant one, as they are the first team in Wales to adopt EDGE to track their study activities so that they can unitise the finance tools developed by Stevie Barre and Mat Davis. The team is excited to work closely with them to maximise EDGE’s research management capabilities – we are thrilled to support them on this next chapter.”
We look forward to working alongside the team at Hywel Dda University Health Board as they begin their EDGE journey and look forward to seeing the positive impact they will make. Welcome to the community!
Photo: Jen Peach, EDGE Knowledge Team Manager with Hywel Dda UHB R&D Team