Doctoral Programmes for Healthcare Professionals

Scheme at a glance Lead applicant career stage: Established researcher Administering organisation location: UK Frequency: One-off Funding amount:

The exact amount awarded will depend on the size and scope of the programme proposed. We expect to fund approximately 12 programmes with an average award value of £12 million.

Funding duration:

5 cohorts with the first intake in autumn 2027

Coapplicants: Accepted Upcoming application stage Calculating next key date… Application process timeline What we mean by ‘doctoral programme’

The aim of this call is to support doctoral programmes that will train the next generation of healthcare professional academics in world-leading research environments across the UK and Republic of Ireland, and retain these talented researchers in the dual career pipeline. We welcome applications from teams who propose to host and administer such a programme at their institution(s) over multiple intakes of fellows.

This call will not directly fund individual fellows – please do not apply with your own doctoral project.

What we mean by 'healthcare professional'

All fellows recruited onto a Wellcome-funded doctoral programme for healthcare professionals must be registered with a professional regulatory body in the UK or Republic of Ireland, for the duration of their fellowship. You can access guidance and a non-exhaustive list of eligible professions.

Who can apply

You can apply to this call to renew an existing programme or to secure funding for a new programme.

Applications must be from a team of established researchers. The lead applicant will be the lead Director of the programme and there can be up to seven coapplicants who will be co-directors of the programme. Together, they will form the programme leadership team. Coapplicants may be based at the same organisation as the lead applicant, or at a different eligible organisation as part of a consortium application (where the programme is hosted across multiple organisations).

The lead applicant must be based at an eligible host organisation in the UK. Co-applicants on consortium applications can be based at an eligible organisation in the UK or the Republic of Ireland.

We encourage applications from teams that are diverse and interdisciplinary, covering multiple areas of expertise and professional backgrounds.

All applicants must be from eligible organisations that can sign up to our grant conditions. We expect all applying organisations to be supportive of the proposed programmes.

Your experience The team Show Lead applicant Show Coapplicants Show Collaborators Show

Read about the different applicant roles at Wellcome.

If you’ve spent time away from research

You can apply for this award if you have spent time away from research (for example, for a career break, parental leave or long-term sick leave). We will take this into consideration during the review of your application.

Working part-time

Lead and coapplicants can be part-time. Part-time applicants should still be able to contribute appropriate time to the project. Their part-time work should be compatible with delivering the project successfully.

Who can't apply

You should not apply for this call if:

You are looking for funding to do your own PhD/DPhil. You intend to carry out activities which involve the transfer of funds into mainland China You cannot demonstrate that your team can dedicate enough time and resources to the programme, if funded

You are already an applicant on two applications for this funding call:

you can only be a lead applicant on one application and a coapplicant on another one, OR you can be a coapplicant on two applications

You must demonstrate that you have sufficient capacity for both programmes if funded. The applications should be for different programmes with no overlap of activities.

Is your organisation right for this call?

The administering organisation is where the lead applicant is based. It is responsible for submitting your final application to Wellcome and managing the finances of the grant if it is awarded.

Where your administering organisation is based

The administering organisation must:

be based in the United Kingdom be able to sign up to Wellcome’s grant conditions

An organisation can only be the administering organisation for up to two applications. The two applications can be either:

one single-institution programme and one programme as the lead of a consortium involving multiple organisations, or two applications as the lead of a consortium involving multiple organisations

An organisation can only be the administering organisation for one single-institution programme, entirely hosted at this organisation. There is no limit on the number of programmes on which an organisation may be a coapplicant.

The organisation can be a:

higher education institution research institute healthcare organisation not-for-profit or non-governmental research organisation

Where the administering organisation is not degree awarding, it must be part of a consortium application with degree awarding organisation(s).

Commercial organisations are not eligible to apply as administering organisations for this call, or as coapplicants. However, collaborators can be based at commercial organisations.

What's expected of lead applicant and coapplicant organisations

We expect all applying organisations (lead and coapplicants) to provide a letter of support as part of the application. In this letter, they must:

guarantee that the space and resources applicants need have been agreed and will be made available to them from the start date through to the end date of the award demonstrate, if they are a part of multiple applications, that there is sufficient capacity to support and/or administer each programme if funded outline how they will recognise the contributions of the programme leadership team and participating supervisors Your research environment

Wellcome believes excellent research happens in environments where people from all backgrounds are treated with respect, are supported and enabled to thrive. A diversity of people and expertise leads to richer understanding and more impactful discoveries. To ensure this is prioritised, Wellcome is committed to assessing Research Environment throughout its application process.

Our definition of a supportive research environment is not limited to the quality of the infrastructure and resources. We take a holistic view that includes the culture and behaviours that create excellent research practice.

We believe that a doctoral programme should be an example of an excellent research environment. Therefore, considerations regarding research environment should be integral to your application. You will have the opportunity to highlight aspects of research environment and culture in your application, where you describe the team’s research vision, academic leadership and programme management. We believe that integrating these criteria into each of the assessment conditions will help embed them throughout successful programmes. You can access guidance on how to discuss research environment in your application.

This requirement is part of our ongoing commitment to promoting positive research environments. It’s particularly important in this case, as a training programme has a unique ability to lead by example.

Is your doctoral programme right for this call? What your doctoral programme proposal must include

Your doctoral programme must:

fit within what we support in Discovery Research have a clear plan for recruitment of diverse applicants, and monitoring and evaluation plans for the recruitment strategy have a specific plan for supporting fellows at pre- and/or post-doctoral transition through career progression activities. be open to all healthcare professionals registered in the UK or Republic of Ireland such as doctors, vets, dentists, clinical psychologists, nurses, midwives and allied health professionals, unless specifically designed around the needs of a particular professional or specialty group What your doctoral programme proposal can include

Your doctoral programme can:

be specifically designed around the needs of a particular professional or specialty group, for example, nurses or physiotherapists, or primary care support research in any discipline – including science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), experimental medicine, humanities and social science, clinical/allied health sciences and population health while remaining within the bounds of what we fund in Discovery Research, either: have a disciplinary or subject focus, OR involve multiple disciplines brought together around a cross-cutting theme include collaborations with industry include collaborations with eligible organisations based anywhere in the world be hosted across multiple organisations, or be hosted at a single institution

What your doctoral programme proposal must not include

Your doctoral programme must not i