The diary of a research student - part 2

by Katharyn Hall

Have you ever wondered what is involved in a research project?

You can find out by reading my regular online diary. I am a postgraduate student based at the University of Sheffield, and I will be working closely with Epilepsy Action throughout my project.

Part two

Staying up-to-date with other studies that are being carried out within the same research field is very important. Any new findings may have significant implications for the research that you are doing, in terms of what results you can expect and the originality (and usefulness) of your work.

In order to keep up to speed with other studies in my area, I have been attending regular epilepsy research meetings in the Neurology department of Royal Hallamshire hospital. This is an incredibly helpful forum in which to discuss ongoing projects with other epilepsy researchers. As well as learning about different research approaches and techniques – it is useful to learn different ways of solving research problems, as there will always be plenty of those!

As well as looking for volunteers to participate in research through Epilepsy Action, I am also recruiting people from four hospitals within South Yorkshire (Sheffield, Chesterfield, Doncaster and Barnsley). It has taken a long time to organise access to these epilepsy clinics, due to the strict NHS governance procedures at each hospital (these are in place to regulate all research within their site). At times, it can be very frustrating to wait for approval; especially when everything else is ready to go! Nevertheless, I finally have approval to go ahead at each hospital, which is great news; it means I have an additional source of volunteers.

In September, I will be speaking at an Epilepsy Action conference in Carnforth. I will be discussing the memory problems experienced by older people with epilepsy, and whether these are epilepsy- or age-related. I am going to be doing a lot more reading to find out exactly what scientific research has shown us about these specific issues. I think it is challenging, but also very rewarding, to communicate quite complex scientific knowledge to the general public in our everyday language. I’m sure that at times, even researchers have difficulty understanding some of the technical language used in scientific journals! And if only a select few can understand the research, it rather defeats the point of doing it in the first place.