Our Expertise
The NIHR Maudsley BRC is a leading academic–healthcare partnership, advancing mental health and neuroscience innovation through world‑class clinical trials and experimental medicine. We work with industry to develop and test new therapeutics, diagnostics and digital health solutions, drawing on our strengths in data science, neuroimaging and NHS expertise.
Lord O’Shaughnessy, Former Health Minister and Senior Partner at consultancy firm Newmarket Strategy visits King’s College London and the NIHR King’s CRF
The NIHR Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) represents one of Europe’s leading academic-healthcare partnerships, in terms of the number of clinical trials we conduct and the total number of patients recruited into them.
Our academic research strengths in psychology, psychiatry and neuroscience gives us a unique advantage in being able to deliver high-quality clinical trials across the field of mental health and neuroscience.
As part of National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), we are one of twenty NIHR Biomedical Research Centres in England.
We have research expertise in a wide range of conditions in mental health and neuroscience, with extensive experience in experimental medicine and early phase clinical trials. Through our external partnerships we are working on a range of clinical trials in novel diagnostics and pharmacological therapeutics.
In health technology, we offer an environment where digital industries can innovate, making use of our informatics and data science expertise to unlock the value of ‘big data’ in health records, while providing expert guidance in NHS information governance. We also offer cross-cutting neuroimaging and -omics expertise, across clinical disorders.
Our Facilities
- Our world-class specialist research facilities include the NIHR King’s Clinical Research Facility (CRF), designed to facilitate clinical studies in mental health and brain sciences research. The NIHR King’s CRF offers 24/7 access to state of the art infrastructure including a high dependency Unit, GMP Cell Therapy Unit, Virtual Reality, ECG and Neuroimaging suites, behavioural assessment and biological sampling facilities. It supports Phase 0 / first-in-man to Phase 2a trials through its NIHR funded Experimental Medicine Facility, and has capacity to support later phase externally sponsored trials through its commercial clinical trials wing.
- Across King’s Health Partners organisations, we offer capacity to support the full range of clinical trial phases from Phase 1 volunteer studies to Phase 3 multi-centre international trials.
- The Centre for Innovative Therapeutics (C-FIT) provides a platform for accessing innovative clinical trials expertise through the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King’s College London.
- The Centre for Translational Informatics provides a vehicle for development, testing, evaluation and implementation of digital interventions in mental health.
- The Centre for Neuroimaging Sciences provides an interdisciplinary research environment with world-leading expertise in application-orientated brain imaging, analysis and clinical expertise for the definition, diagnosis and treatment of neurological and psychiatric disorders.
Access to Cohorts
We have access to a diverse range of well-characterised research-ready cohorts and healthy controls, which means that we can deliver trials and other well-designed studies quickly and efficiently, for example
- Our world-leading Clinical Record Informatics Search (CRIS) provides regulated, secure access to de-identified electronic health records, enhanced by sophisticated natural language processing capabilities.
- Through South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust’s innovative Consent for Contact (C4C) initiative, we have patients currently registered from our clinical services, who have given permission to be approached for research participation.
- The NIHR Maudsley BioResource (part of the national NIHR BioResource initiative) provides access to deep phenotyped, re-contactable participants.
- Our BioResource is complemented by a comprehensive suite of methodological support and biomedical technology platforms, including high throughput ‘-omic’ technologies spanning genomics, proteomics and metabolomics research
- Our wide-ranging external research partnerships – including with UK Biobank, Invicro and Genomics England’s 100,000 Genome Project – allow us to capitalise on both national and local resources.
Research support services
Our wide-ranging research support services offer comprehensive, streamlined support for trial management, governance and statistical services.
- Our King’s Health Partners Clinical Trials Office has a Commercial team who provide a single interface for those wishing to conduct trials sponsored by the pharmaceutical and allied healthcare industries across King’s Health Partners organisations.
- The Clinical Trials Office Quality Team supports investigators at King’s Health Partners institutions who undertake clinical trials where King’s Health Partners are sponsor or co-sponsor, to ensure delivery of the statutory obligations contingent on sponsorship of trials. They are fully UKCRC registered.
- Our UKCRC-registered King’s Clinical Trials Unit is available to provide support to academic led trials across King’s Health Partner organisations and externally.