Watch the video explaining the application review stages
Once submitted, your application progresses through several review stages. Some apply to all studies; others apply only to specific study types.
- R&I office administrator review: The R&I administrator completes an initial screening to ensure that all required documents are included and that the application meets minimum submission criteria. When this is complete, the application is assigned to the appropriate reviewers.
- Data protection officer review: The data protection officer reviews the data protection impact assessment, data protection documents, the PIL and the ICF. This step ensures that all data handling processes comply with data protection regulations and institutional policies.
- Clinical Research Facility review (where applicable): If the study requires support from the Clinical Research Facility, the CRF team reviews the application. This includes assessing staffing availability, equipment needs, participant safety considerations and regulatory compliance.
- Nursing Research Access Committee review (where applicable): If the study involves nurses or healthcare assistants as participants, the Nursing Research Access Committee examines the project to ensure that it is suitable, feasible and appropriately designed.
- Research Finance Manager review: Where there is funding for a project or where the hospital is likely to incur costs for the research, the research finance manager reviews the application to ensure that it is accurate, feasible and compliant with financial and institutional requirements.
- Ethics review: To progress to the next stage of the review process, the study must have ethics approval in place. This approval may come either from your institutional research ethics committee (if already obtained) or from JREC, if you have submitted the ethics application as part of the Infonetica submission. If the applicant submits the R&I application without the letter of ethics approval, the application will be returned in an unlocked format to allow the letter to be uploaded.
- Legal review: The legal director reviews any contracts, agreements or other legal documents linked to the study to confirm full legal and regulatory compliance.
- CEO approval: The chief executive officer reviews the application and grants approval for the study to proceed.
- R&I programme manager confirmation: The R&I programme manager completes the final check, confirms that all required approvals are in place and issues the R&I approval letter before the study begins.