Research Project Manager

Why you should consider a research study for your business and/or musculoskeletal clinic

The data confirms it – whatever we’re doing isn’t working

Across the world, Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSD-1) are reaching epidemic proportions. The World Health Organisation’s Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study suggests that up to 33% of people worldwide live with a painful musculoskeletal condition.

A recent report from the United States suggests that one in two adult Americans live with a musculoskeletal condition.

Closer to home and according to the UK’s Health and Safety Executive in their Work Related Musculoskeletal Disorder Statistics (WRMSDs) report back in 2014/15, sickness absence from work cost the UK £14.3 billion that year, and 40% of the loss was due to work-related MSDs. The number of working days lost due to work-related MSDs was estimated to be over 9.5 million.

Our inability to overcome MSDs has helped create a far worse problem – opioid use and abuse

Leveraging research to improve your patient outcomes

I believe there is a way clinics and practices can turn the Musculoskeletal Disorder (MSD-1) stalemate around, for the good of their patients, their lifestyles and their careers. By conducting research on your patient data, we can create an algorithm that boosts your understanding and expertise, and thus leads to more successful outcomes for those in your care.

It starts with the search for each patient’s ‘MSD Signature’

Think of each of your patients as having a unique ’MSD signature’ which work like an aircraft’s ‘Black Box.’ In an aviation disaster, the Black Box tells us what went awry. The MSD signature works in a similar way – it’s how the human body tells us what’s gone wrong to lead to an MSD, and what may continue to deteriorate so the original MSD evolves into Musculoskeletal Disease (MSD-2).

This is how what I do, benefits you

How I work with you

I’ll come to your business and become part of your team to lead a unique research project; one we design to satisfy your clearly defined scientific objectives and the goals you set for your business/clinic to achieve. I’ll help to identify the best research methods to deliver those goals and objectives in a systematic and independent way and I’ll also take on the responsibility for reviewing the research related to fieldwork in MSDs.

I’ll then work alongside your team to explore the MSD signatures of your patients. This will also involve continuously probing the data to give you a greater understanding of the issues and outcomes which can be turned into a crucial advantage in the successful delivery of treatment for patients and the management of their wellbeing.

Accessing, analysing and actioning data

Information is the lifeblood of a research study and while data collection is at a study’s heart, it tends to be the least exciting aspect. So I’ll undertake the collection and validating of all the data, to help in setting up your clinic’s algorithm and identifying those MSD signatures.

I’ll then author a study report and present and communicate all our findings to your team, so that everyone can share, understand and put into action our findings.

How all these inputs lead to successful outcomes

With my study and report completed, you’ll have a crucial learning opportunity: one that will empower your team to proactively respond, to develop the meaningful evolution of assessments, treatment, referrals, and corrective exercises for their patients.

From this point, your clinicians have an early opportunity to succesfully modify and manage the MSD signatures of their patients, reduce their risk of MSDs occurring and reduce their reliance on medication.

Hindsight and foresight

I’ll then develop and deliver a ‘Dashboard’ for your practice, which can give your team a powerful overview of all the data entered at the clinical level. This will not only help you to identify MSD signatures but empower you to help your patients, so that their musculoskeletal disorder does not become a musculoskeletal disease.

I will also help you to develop and build strategies to reduce the MSD statistics of your clinic, using a specific algorithm from my PhD research.

Less a cost on your business/clinic, more an investment in its future

This kind of study is a low cost, high pay-off option for your team, where my edge in this specialist field of research can give your clinic an edge in the marketplace.

These projects empower your clinicians by changing the mindset to a growth mindset, which is vital for patient and industry progression. What’s more, you are supported by your MSD Dashboard that will enable you to monitor trends in patient data and lead to the early identification of any living environment system or lifestyle factors that may be contributing to MSDs to reduce ongoing risk.

Working together to give your team direction and drive

My in-business/clinic research studies are not about short-term gain but long-term partnership, so I’ll help train your team in completing data entry and the effective use of your Dashboard.

I’ll also work with you all on strategies and referrals to empower your clinicians and therapists become more proactive and less reactive to patient need, thus helping the individual’s personal understanding and management of their own situation to change the paradigm.

LET ME SUPPORT YOU TACKLING THE EMERGING THREAT OF MUSCULOSKELETAL DISORDERS AND DISEASE

The most common precipitating cause of Musculoskeletal Diseases (MSD), and the most complex mechanism that influences the most structures (Bullock-Saxton, Janda, & Bullock, 1993), is chronic overuse injury from repetitive loading that strains biological tissue inducing microtrauma within the musculoskeletal system (Knight, 2008; Seffinger & Hruby, 2007). With non-optimal repetitive loading situations being the primary cause for premature ageing associated with Musculoskeletal Disorders which, and if not identified and treated early, become a Musculoskeletal Disease (Arendt & Dick, 1995; M. R. Broer & Zernicke, 1979; Carlsoo, 1972a; Danis, Krebs, Gill-Body, & Sahrmann, 1998; Downing, 1981; Greenman, 1996; Knight, 2008; Paris, 2015; Peterson-Kendall, Kendall-McCreary, Geise-Province, McIntyre-Rodgers, & Romani, 2005; Sahrmann, 2002; Taylor-Still, 1902).

Early identification, diagnosis and effective treatment of Musculoskeletal disorder may support reducing the worrying Musculoskeletal Disorders world health statistics (Apkarian, Baliki, & Geha, 2009; Bergman, 2007; UK, 2014).

(EXCERPT FROM JO ABBOTTS PHD THESIS: 2019)

Contact Jo to explore this service further.

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