Clinical Research Facility

The Paediatric Clinical Research Facility, known as the Coral Reef, is located in the main building of Bristol Royal Hospital for Children, the dedicated children’s hospital for Southwest England.

The scheme is for the refurbishment and re-use of the existing medical records unit to provide ward space, consultation rooms and associated support spaces for the proposed clinical research facility.

The paediatric CRF opened in November 2023 and consists of two clinic rooms for patient visits ensuring privacy and a calm environment to support the patient and family experience. In addition, there is a two bedded bay for those patients who need to stay longer and, when required, for overnight research visits to support those in early phase and/or complex trials.

The location of the Coral Reef means optimum support of early phase and/or experimental research for patients within multiple clinical specialities and thus improving accessibility to trials for the paediatric patient population.

The Coral Reef staff also provide support and care to patients in early phase trials who are cared for within inpatient areas in BRHC where treatment is often initiated. This is most prevalent in those children and young people participating in haematology, oncology and BMT trials.

The Coral Reef refurbishment was funded by the Bristol and Weston Hospitals Charity.

“The new facility will enable us to participate in trials which can be life transforming and potentially curative, like gene therapy studies.This Clinical Research Facility makes Bristol a cutting edge treatment site for rare paediatric disease, which has meant either children having to travel, or often missing out on novel therapies for rare conditions.”

Professor A.V.Ramanan, consultant rheumatologist at UHBW