Research & Innovation at CHI

Children’s Health Ireland

The amalgamation of the hospitals within the CHI group (Crumlin, Temple St, and Tallaght), and the construction of our new Children’s Hospital represents a fantastic opportunity not just for the delivery of the highest quality clinical care, but also game changing research and innovation. CHI has an extremely hard-working, enthusiastic, and creative workforce with the dedication to constantly improve the care that we deliver to our patients all over Ireland. We have a fantastic opportunity to build a world-class research and innovation environment for children on the island of Ireland.

Research and Innovation is built into the fabric of the new Children's Hospital, which will have facilities throughout to support research and innovation, including a purpose-built clinical research facility to help us to carry out advanced clinical trials in children. We are working with our partners in the Children’s Health Foundation to advance plans for our Children’s Research and Innovation Centre (CRIC) on the campus and we will be working very closely with our colleagues at Saint James’s Hospital to develop a truly integrated academic healthcare campus for people of all ages.

The CHI Research and Innovation Office was established a number of years ago to drive future progress in terms of delivering impactful research and innovation to help our patients. Bringing together expertise from all over Children’s Health Ireland and with our partners we have grown our team and now provide seamless, integrated services to researchers and innovators within CHI. Our team continues to grow and we are focused on doing as much as we can to support staff and researchers so that we can deliver the greatest benefit to the children who attend our services.

Page contents

On this page you will find information about:

Children’s Health Ireland
Academic Health Science Centre
National Children's Research Centre
Research
Innovation
Contact

Academic Health Science Centre

As a research and teaching hospital we have very strong links with our university partners. CHI is fortunate to have four key local academic partners in Dublin, with whom we work very closely in terms of training the next generation of healthcare staff. These universities, DCU, UCD, RCSI and TCD have a long history of ties with CHI and our clinical sites. In order to harness the enormous potential from the coming together of CHI and the strong partnerships we have with our universities, we have developed an academic health science system for children (AHSS). AHS systems seek to integrate research, innovation, training and clinical care seamlessly together and are an essential component in the delivery of the highest quality of health care. Their role in advancing clinical care has been recognised all around the world. Our Academic Health Science Centre will drive future progress and integration between CHI and our university partners and ensure that we can deliver the best outcomes for our patients through research and innovation.

In an effort to ensure that CHI has a truly all island reach, we are also developing an academic partnership model with our colleagues from hospitals and universities outside of Dublin, linked with the developing clinical network, to support a truly integrated national approach to research and innovation for children.

National Children's Research Centre

The National Children’s Research Centre has been at the heart of paediatric research in Ireland and internationally for over four decades. Founded in 1965, it was the first dedicated research centre on the site of an Irish hospital. It offers a state of the art facility for biomedical research. NCRC has developed resources for clinical research, has recognised expertise in competitive grant awarding in paediatric research and a translational research laboratory on the CHI Crumlin site; this will transfer to the CRIC in due course. Funded from its inception by Children’s Health Foundation, and its predecessor organisation CMRF, NCRC services have more recently been seamlessly integrated with CHI’s research services. We are now jointly delivering a comprehensive support package for all types of children’s research and innovation for CHI.

Research

Our office supports research throughout Children’s Health Ireland. We are developing a comprehensive program of work, based on CHI’s strategy for research, that will seek to support researchers at all levels to improve outcomes for children through their work. For high complexity research and clinical trials in a hospital setting, one of the essential elements in being able to deliver safe and effective projects is a Clinical Research Centre. CHI operates a Clinical Research Centre (CRC) across all CHI sites. Supported by the Health Research Board (HRB) and Children’s Health Foundation (CHF), the CHI-CRC enables CHI researchers to carry out complex projects and trials in a safe regulatory environment. The CRC at CHI is connected to the National Clinical Trials Office (NCTO), an umbrella organisation streamlining all clinical trials activity and centres across Ireland.

Innovation

Our innovation team in CHI is motivated to foster and grow an environment in CHI where complex healthcare problems can be addressed through innovative and creative solutions. Working with academic and industry partners, we will ensure that innovative new treatments, products and services are designed with our patients and families at the centre. Our Innovation strategy outlines our plans for the next few years as we move to the new hospital.

Contact

For general Research and Innovation enquiries, contact rio@childrenshealthireland.ie.

For queries relating to the CHI Clinical Research Centre, please contact mary.costello@childrenshealthireland.ie.

For innovation queries please contact innovation@childrenshealthireland.ie.

For queries in relation to research labs, grants and research communications please contact isabella.bray@childrenshealthireland.ie

For queries relating to clinical trial feasibilities, please contact jenny.lennon@childrenshealthireland.ie

Keep an eye out for new content on the Research and Innovation page over the coming months.