Senior Research Assistant

This thirty-two month post will enable you to explore how counter fraud is currently delivered within the NHS in England and to generate a range of recommendations and resources about how the current provision could be reorganised and strengthened.

We want to work with a great qualitative and/or design researcher, who has excellent practical, analytic and conceptual skills. You will be working as part of a friendly and supportive multi-disciplinary team - including colleagues with disciplinary backgrounds in law, criminology and medical sociology. You will be based in the Implementation and Innovation Research Group (IIR) at Northumbria University, working primarily with Tim Rapley and Tom Sanders.

Working as part of multi-disciplinary team, you will support the delivery of qualitative, co-development and evaluation work on the NIHR HSDR funded SCAN research project by undertaking research activity, writing up research work for publication and collaborating with project partners.

You will undertake qualitative interviews and document analysis to explore the role of regional forums and organisations in NHS counter fraud knowledge exchange. You will undertake co-design workshops with the public, NHS and counter fraud stakeholders to develop and prototype a range of recommendations and resources to strengthen the counter fraud response. You will undertake a formal evaluation - potentially including interviews, focus groups, surveys, observation - of a selection of the resources that we have co-developed. Some of the fieldwork will be conducted in person, so at times there will be travel to different parts of England, some will also be conducted remotely.

The SCAN study seeks to understand how counter fraud is currently delivered within the NHS in England and how could this provision be reorganised and strengthened to reduce negative impacts on public trust, quality of care and losses within NHS budgets. This is a mixed-methods study, which will map the existing national policy and strategy framework, Identify the role of regional forums and organisations, explore the daily practices of local counter fraud service providers and develop and evaluate a range of recommendations and resources addressing competency, skills and joined up working to strengthen the counter fraud response.

Good practical, analytic and conceptual skills in qualitative research. You will hold a PhD, have submitted your PhD or be about to submit your PhD in the next two months, or have equivalent experience, in a health, design and/or social science related discipline.

Good practical, analytic and conceptual skills in co-design/co-production Is desirable, as is knowledge of contemporary debates in relation to the organisation of health care, and knowledge of debates and challenges relating to counter-fraud. Ability to travel for purpose of data collection to various locations in the UK is essential.

The study is a collaboration between university partners - Northumbria University and Manchester University.

You will be embedded in the Implementation and Innovation Research Group (IIR) - a small friendly cross departmental group between Departments of Nursing, Midwifery and Health and Social Work, Education and Community Wellbeing at Northumbria University. IIRs work ranges from initiation, scoping and development of novel ideas for service, therapeutic and care innovations, to feasibility studies, pilot and full trials with embedded process evaluations, as well as the scaling up and scaling out of evidence-based interventions. IIR works with key health and social care stakeholders to develop innovative, individualised, community-based and organisational solutions to problems of implementation and knowledge mobilisation through applied research. Through high quality research, we develop theories, tools and methodologies as well as interventions to support implementation and knowledge mobilisation in practice.

You will be formally based in the Department of Social Work, Education and Community Wellbeing within the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences at Northumbria University, Coach Lane campus, one of five departments within the Faculty of Health and Life Sciences., Northumbria University is a research-intensive university that unlocks potential for all. We change lives regionally, nationally, and internationally through education and research, tackling the global challenges of our age to transform society and the economy. Find out why we were named Times Higher Education's University of the Year in 2022 and Modern University of the Year in The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2025.

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