31st July 2024

How Dr Annie Hendry helped shape the future of Welsh health care through research

Health and Care Research Wales aims to improve health and social care for people and communities across Wales through our funding schemes and the support we offer. We help a wide range of research projects and researchers like Dr Annie Hendry, who is now mentoring the next generation of researchers.

Dr Annie Hendry is a full-time Research Officer at the North Wales Centre for Primary Care Research, Bangor. Annie is a qualitative researcher whose research interests include health services, stigma in healthcare and patient and carer perspectives.

Annie completed a Health and Care Research Wales PhD studentship in 2019 where she looked at the experiences of smokers who live with smoking related problems and how they felt about getting a lung cancer diagnosis.

“Cancer was a subject with which I had little personal experience, however this changed as the study went on and during my PhD as two people I cared about deeply were diagnosed with, and died from, cancer.”

Participants in the study described not wanting to waste doctor’s valuable time with symptoms that they felt were minor or were self-inflicted due to smoking. Annie’s PhD thesis concluded there’s a need for new interventions to encourage people who smoke to seek primary care early without the fear of being judged.

“The PhD studentship from Health and Care Research Wales not only opened the door to Welsh research community for me but it also gave me the chance to develop my skills through training opportunities.

“The application process is a lot of work which is not surprising. However, it helps you get your head around what you are trying to do and most importantly what you are trying to achieve with your research.”

Annie is the one supervising students and encouraging them to step into the world of research with the help of Health and Care Research Wales.

“I’m supervising two PhD students with one of them going through the application process for a Health and Care Research Wales funding award.”

Stella Wright, lead Research Officer for Primary and Community Care and PhD Student at Bangor University, one of Annie’s mentees, said:

“Annie, my supervisor, has been amazing. When I applied for funding for the first time, she really helped me out. She showed me the Health and Care Research Wales Faculty webinar focused on writing applications and even got more advice from someone else in the field. Her support made a stressful process much easier and I’m thankful for her guidance.”

The Health and Care Research Wales Faculty has several funding schemes opening in September and October, including the Advancing Researcher Scheme, the Personal Award Accelerator and the Trials Development award. Sign up to our newsletter to be the first to know when the applications for the funding schemes open.