The £5m grant was awarded by Health Data Research UK to establish a health data research hub for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) following a successful bid led by Eastern AHSN and Cambridge University Health Partners.

The Cambridge based hub will be one of seven hubs set up across the UK to speed up research for new medicines and treatments, support quicker diagnoses and potentially save lives.

Miles Parkes, Consultant Gastroenterologist said: That IBD won this large award from UKRI reflects the collegiality in the UK IBD community – clinicians, researchers and patients working together to produce the world-leading platform that is the IBD BioResource allied to the infrastructure of the IBD Registry. No other disease area was in a position to challenge the case for support for IBD, and for that we are grateful to IBD teams across the UK who have helped build the IBD BioResource and to whom this success is due. IBD BioResource is already accessible for downstream studies by any investigator (for details please see www.ibdbioresource.nihr.ac.uk); and the ‘IBD hub’ functionality will rapidly increase for those who want to access that.

Recruitment to the IBD BioResource continues. The main cohort currently stands at 27,500, and with recruitment on-going at 1000/month we have a new target of 50,000 patients. This all adds to the power of the platform. Many thanks to clinical colleagues and CRN nurses for focusing recruitment efforts on such newly diagnosed patients.