IMPACCT Rapid Program - new user guides for simpler clinician participation

Although 2023 has only just started (or at least, that’s what it feels like) we’ve been working hard here at IMPACCT to simplify and streamline the process of participating in the IMPACCT Rapid Program.

About Rapid

The Rapid Program devises and coordinates international, multi-site, consecutive cohort studies, all through clinician participation. These series investigate the harms and benefits of pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions in the adult and paediatric palliative and supportive care populations.

With a focus on rapid data collection, collation, analysis, and reporting through original research publications, this program strives to rapidly influence best practice to improve the quality of life of people accessing palliative and supportive care.

The IMPACCT Rapid Program has been running since 2011. With 24 series currently open across 106 active sites in 16 countries, the IMPACCT Rapid Program's global footprint is only getting bigger. The program is making a real impact on clinical decision making in both prescribing and allied health and nursing interventions.

Getting involved

As the Rapid Program has increased in size and ambition, we have had to consolidate our application and development pathways. To that end, we have spent the start of 2023 developing user guides to make getting involved, getting started, and developing a new IMPACCT Rapid Program series straightforward and easy to use.

The user guides are tailored to what clinicians need to know and include clear and easy-to-follow instructions for every step of the way. Access the user guides on the Rapid Resources page.

Getting involved in the Rapid Program is easy! Just follow these steps (and refer to our new ‘getting involved’ user guide):

1. Become a PaCCSC or CST member
2. Express your interest and become a participating site
3. Confirm ethics/governance approval
4. Choose one or more series to join
5. Collect data for your chosen series

If you’re interested in developing a Rapid series in collaboration with us, please refer to our new user guide, ‘Developing a new series for the IMPACCT Rapid Program’. user guide.

Benefits

While we find that the biggest draw to clinicians is involvement in defining and refining the standards of care and clinical practice in their chosen fields, there are many additional benefits to participating in the Rapid Program.

These include membership of a high-output research group, with close involvement in the authorship and publication of rigorous, peer-reviewed, original research articles. Clinicians also further develop their research skills and capacity; most can collect Continuing Professional Development (CPD) points from their involvement.

Additionally, the Rapid Program provides clinicians the opportunity to collaborate with other sites and clinicians from around the country and around the world, expanding their academic networks.

Participating is simple due to our streamlined application process, our predefined protocol and research framework, which participating sites can begin using immediately. Due to the nature of the Rapid Program, our series are low negligible risk (LNR) studies and can have ethics approval waived, making governance applications quick and simple.

Finally, for Australian sites, participating in the Rapid Program can help your facility meet accreditation standards as laid out by the National Safety and Quality Health Service standards and the Revised Aged Care Quality standards.

We hope you consider joining us in conducting cutting-edge clinical research, and if you have any questions, feedback, or ideas for new series please contact us at rapid@uts.edu.au 

Jack Power is a UTS IMPACCT research assistant and final-year medical student. He is also undertaking a concurrent Master of Medicine at the University of Sydney. Jack has research interests in palliative care, oncology, and surgery.