‘On the Shoulders of Giants’ is a series of educational online talks where experts will bring their perspectives to encourage and challenge wider thinking within the cancer research community.

Professor Shaun Treweek is Professor of Health Services Research in the Health Services Research Unit at the University of Aberdeen. He is leading an initiative called Trial Forge that aims to be more systematic about how we generate and use research evidence in making trial design, conduct, analysis and reporting decisions.

In this lecture, Professor Treweek will talk about why we need to think more about who is in our trials, not only in terms of clinical characteristics, but sociodemographic characteristics too. Shaun will focus on trials but the message is relevant for all health research: we need to think more carefully about who we involve.

About the speaker

Shaun is a health services researcher interested in efficient trial design, particularly around inclusive recruitment and retention and the effective presentation of research evidence. He led the development of the NIHR INCLUDE Ethnicity Framework, a tool to help trialists design inclusive trials and PRECIS-2, a tool to match trial design decisions to what the users of the results need. He leads an initiative called Trial Forge (http://www.trialforge.org) that aims to be more systematic about how we identify, generate and use research evidence in making trial design, conduct, analysis and reporting decisions. In 2019 Trial Forge won the international Cochrane-REWARD Prize for outstanding work in reducing waste in research. Finally, Shaun is an Editor-in-Chief of the journal Trials.

NCITA ‘On the Shoulders of Giants’ lecture series

o April 2022: ‘Screening for Cancer: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly’ with Prof. Michael Baum. Link to blog & recording: https://ncita.org.uk/recording-available-for-professor-baums-ncita-lecture-screening-for-cancer-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly

o May 2022: ‘Is Pursuing “a Passion for Science” a Position of Privilege?’ with Dr Heather Williams MBE. Link to blog & recording: https://ncita.org.uk/recording-available-for-dr-heather-williams-ncita-lecture

o June 2022: ‘Academia & Industry: What are the Ingredients for Successful Collaborations?' with Kieran Murphy and Prof. Evis Sala. Link to blog & recording: https://ncita.org.uk/recording-available-for-academia-industry-successful-collaborations

o July 2022: ‘Striving for Evidence – With and Without a Randomised Controlled Trial’ with Prof. Tom Treasure. Link to blog & recording: https://ncita.org.uk/recording-available-for-striving-for-evidence-with-and-without-a-randomised-controlled-trial

The Importance of Diversity in Trials and Other Health Research