Medical School Summer Research Internship – Football Cancer Pre-habilitation Programme: an initial process and outcomes evaluation of group-based pre-habilitation delivered in community football clubs.
Role Overview
Please note: these internships are only available to current undergraduate students in Lancaster University Medical School.
This internship is offered as part of research opportunities for Medical School undergraduate students (MBChB and SaES). Each internship will be supervised by an academic member of staff. These opportunities are designed to give students experience of contributing to university research. These internships would be ideal for students considering postgraduate study, intercalated degrees or specialised foundation programmes.
Preferred Start Date: 21st of July 2025
Expected End Date: 29th of August 2025
Interview date: Early July- TBC after exams
Weekly Hours: 20 hours per week
Duration: 4 weeks (there is some flexibility over the summer vacation period)
Location: Work from home, the campus library, or use the hot desk space in Health Innovation One. Meetings with supervisor may be remote via Microsoft Teams or in-person depending of work schedules.
Project Summary:
This internship is offered as part of an exciting pilot evaluation of a new model of care, delivering prehab support for cancer patients undergoing treatment and potentially awaiting surgery, taking a personalised approach, and incorporating social prescribing. This opportunity will give students experience of collecting and/or analysing service evaluation data to support evidence-based decision-making in healthcare.
Lancashire and South Cumbria Cancer Alliance are piloting a community-based cancer pre-habilitation programme delivered across eight English Football League clubs in Lancashire and South Cumbria. Any patient aged over 18 years, with a new diagnosis of cancer, and on a cancer treatment pathway (including palliative care) are eligible for referral. Patients attend group-based sessions involving adapted physical activity; and support with nutrition, mental wellbeing and lifestyle behaviour change (for example, reducing alcohol intake or stopping smoking). The aim is to enhance patients’ physical and mental health and wellbeing prior to completion of cancer treatment, supporting a reduction in side effects from cancer treatment and a faster return to the patients’ desired quality of life. You can find out more about the project here:https://www.lancashireandsouthcumbria.icb.nhs.uk/news-and-media/latest-news/lancashire-and-south-cumbria-football-ccos-unite-cancer-prehab
The aim of the evaluation is to evidence the reach, acceptability, feasibility of delivery and engagement, initial behavioural outcomes, and wider impact of the programme. These initial insights have the potential to inform the future delivery of the programme and strengthen their evidence base to secure future funding for the service.
There are two distinct projects within this internship, so we ask that applicants clearly state their preference in their application cover letter. The application can be tailored to the main project of interest, or if students are interested by both options the application can be written to encompass both. Although the students can be considered for both, if successful they can only do one.
Project 1: Quantitative evaluation of clinical outcomes and the programme satisfaction survey.
o This internship will be involved in the quantitative aspects of the evaluation to analyse end-of-programme clinical outcomes and satisfaction survey data
o All quantitative data is currently captured by the service and can be shared anonymously with Lancaster University for analysis. The supervisors will have access to this data in advance of the internship commencing.
Project 2: Qualitative evaluation of patient and delivery staff experience and satisfaction with the programme.
o This internship will focus on the qualitative aspects of the evaluation to provide insights from both patients and service delivery staff.
o The qualitative data will need to be collected by Lancaster University in the form of focus groups and ethical approval will besought prior to the internship commencing.
Key sources of data for both projects include:
- Engagement: attendance and adherence to the programme
- Personal characteristics: age group, gender, cancer specialty, planned treatment
- Acceptability and feasibility: patient and staff satisfaction with the programme, and ease of delivery and engagement captured through surveys and focus groups.
- Outcomes: patient and staff feedback/perceptions/experiences of the impact on outcomes such as Smoking status (self-reported), Alcohol consumption (self-reported units), Mental wellbeing (WEBWBS questionnaire) through surveys, focus groups or interviews.
- Impact:
o Project 1 - Frailty (Rockwood frailty score),Measure of physical fitness – leg strength and endurance (30s sit to stand test), Health and disability (WHO Disability Assessment Schedule 36 item),Quality of Life (EQ5D-5L), patient and staff feedback through survey
o Project 2 - patient and staff feedback/perceptions/experiences of the impact of the programme through focus groups or interviews.