Barts 900 Clinical Research Facility - Barts Charity

A pioneering Clinical Research Facility at The Royal London Hospital

Putting East London at the forefront of healthcare innovations

Clinical trials are an essential step in getting the most promising new therapies available to those who need them most. A Clinical Research Facility is where this important work happens, with some of these spaces designed to host early-phase trials—when treatments are first made available to a small, select group.

These clinical trials have enormous value for participants, clinicians and the scientific community. But until now, there hasn’t been anywhere in East London suitable for early-phase clinical trials. This has made it harder for patients to gain potential benefit from new drugs, has limited options for clinicians and for locally-led research.

But this is about to change.

We’re partnering with Barts Health NHS Trust and Queen Mary University of London to build a new, early phase Clinical Research Facility at The Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel. And our generous donors are helping to make it happen.

"By building a state-of-the-art Clinical Research Facility at The Royal London Hospital, more of our diverse local population will be able to take part in drug trials, helping us to make sure these new drugs are safe and effective for everyone.”
Professor Rupert Pearse, Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at Queen Mary University of London

What will the new Clinical Research Facility enable: our vision

  •  More trials, spanning more diseases, particularly those where our local population has higher incidence and/or poorer outcomes
  • Improved local access to novel therapies
  • Increased opportunities for clinicians to engage in research, something which we know improves patient outcomes across the board

Benefitting from diversity

We still know too little about how effective particular drugs may be in patients from different ethnic backgrounds. This problem can be compounded when clinical trials for new treatments don’t adequately reflect the make-up of the likely patient population. But by conducting more early phase trials in East London—and by ensuring that eligible patients from all of our many communities can participate—we will be helping to ensure better outcomes: for our patients, for London, and for the world.

The project recently received the endorsement of a £1 million National Institute of Health and Care Research (NIHR) Clinical Research Facility infrastructure award, allowing us to join the national NIHR CRF network.

Learn more