APEx End of Year Report by Professor Richard Neal – Director of APEx (Exeter Collaboration for Academic Primary Care).

Posted by ma403

20 December 2024

Wow, it has been an amazing year, and my first full year as Director of APEx (Exeter Collaboration for Academic Primary Care). I wanted to take this opportunity to give an overview of the year in some numbers. And there have been so many achievements over the past 12 months, that I am not going to try and name names here.

In terms of dissemination of our work and impact, we have had our hugely successful seminar programme, regular social media activity (‘Xs’ although I’d still rather call them ‘tweets’), at least a couple of TV appearances, and three inaugural professorial lectures. And all this in addition to our standard academic metrics of very many conference presentations (including an Exeter takeover of a Melbourne meeting) and at least 160 peer reviewed publication that I am aware of.

We continue to excel at capacity building and are fast becoming the place for primary care career progression. I have counted three PhDs, at least eight early/mid career fellowships awarded, four senior promotions (one to Prof, two to Assoc Prof and one to Senior Research Fellow), one NIHR Senior Investigator Award, a Prix Gallien, plus numerous prizes for PhD students, conference presentations and teaching. And as one Co-Chair of SAPC steps down, another of our very own will step up.

Internally we have welcomed several new members of staff and students, and have successfully co-located one of our key research groups within the Smeall Building. So, whilst most of us are now in the same place we continue to look outwards in our collaborative work in the University and beyond. We have also finalised our core research themes (Primary Care Delivery, Rehabilitation, Mental Health, Long Term conditions, and Cancer), and each of these themes is now working well. The new Post-graduate Certificate in Primary Care has also been launched.

And along the way we have landed many grants from a varied portfolio of funders including NIHR (HTA, HSDR, PDG, Global, SPCR, Three Schools), Wellcome, MRC, CRUK, and AMS. In addition to lots of small grants, I’ve counted 18 ‘medium size’ grants (£25-250K) and six upwards of ~£1M. I look forward to these delivering impactful findings.

Some of our staff have found time for other things also. I’ve counted three marathons / triathlons, one engagement, and two babies. We’ve also had one significant departure and one significant retirement (and this is where I do name names!). Ellie Kingsland left us at the end of the summer for a new role in Bristol. There were concerns that the place may fall apart without her, but it hasn’t, at least not yet. And John Campbell retired also at the end of the summer. It’s essentially because of him that we all have great jobs here, so we did make sure he had a jolly good send off. Ellie and John – we miss you both!

We have huge challenges in 2025 – not least an expected call to apply for membership of the next iteration of the NIHR School for Primary Care Research. As first time members, we have done especially well out of this iteration of the School, and are well placed as a team to put together a first rate application for next time around.

So, to finish, huge thanks and congratulations to all our staff, at all grades and across all job roles. Everyone of you has contributed to our success over the past 12 months. I’m also aware that some folk have worked through quite challenging personal circumstances, so especial thanks to those.

Wishing you all the best for the festive season and a happy New Year.

Richard