Updates on my experience working on the vitamin D study In my previous blog, I described my experience working on the vitamin D research project as part of my Student Selected Component (SCP). This is a project organised by the River Island Academic Centre for Paediatrics and Child Health in collaboration with the Imperial Self-Care Academic Research Unity (SCARU), aiming to find out more about what people in the UK know and think about vitamin D, using an electronic questionnaire. It falls under the category of “formative research”, which is research aiming to gather data useful for the development and implementation of health initiatives(1). In the first week of my SCP attachment, I was mainly involved with the questionnaire, as I described in my last blog entry. In the following three weeks, I continued developing the questionnaire and I also worked on the study protocol, a step necessary to get ethics approval. In this blog, I describe my experience in developing a study pro
In the UK around 1 in 5 people have low levels of vitamin D. This can have important consequences because vitamin D is essential for bone health, and low levels can lead to bone problems such as osteoporosis and osteomalacia. Vitamin D is needed for everyone at all stages of life, from newborns and childhood, to adolescence, adulthood, and old age – which I find very exciting and fascinating. Being interested in paediatrics, endocrinology and neurology, and considering following a clinical academic path in the future, I decided to pursue a research project in vitamin D for my Specialty choice placement (SCP). Vitamin D deficiency Over the past few weeks I have been working with Dr Tanna, a consultant pharmacist, and Prof Blair, a consultant paediatrician with an interest in public health, on a research project about vitamin D aiming to understand the knowledge, attitudes and practices of people living in the UK. In the UK vitamin D deficiency is very common, and therefore the NHS rec