Welcome to the NIHR Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce
PLEASE NOTE:
- The Unit offices at the Virginia Woolf Building closed on 1 August 2025.
- Our new offices (very nearby) are open for visitors from early September 2025: Melbourne House, 44-46 Aldwych, London, WC2B 4LL (Strand campus of King's College London).
- Getting to Melbourne House: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/visit/melbourne-house
- New postal address: HSCWRU, Policy Institute, Melbourne House, King’s College London, 30 Aldwych, London, WC2B 4BG.
The National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Health and Social Care Workforce Research Unit (HSCWRU) exists to develop research knowledge in the health and social care workforce field and to disseminate findings to policymakers, service providers, employers, and patient, service user and carer groups. The Director of the Unit is Professor Annette Boaz.
HSCWRU is an NIHR Policy Research Unit. Core funded by the NIHR’s Policy Research Programme (PRP), we also receive grants following competitive tender from a variety of other funders. We are affiliated with the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration South London (leading its social care theme) and we work closely with the NIHR School for Social Care Research. See an overview of our research and more about our work as a Policy Research Unit.
The Unit was established in January 2019, growing out of a policy research unit dedicated solely to the social care workforce, which ran from 2002-18. The current NIHR Policy Research Programme award runs for five years (2024-28) and the Unit announced its programme of work in March 2024. Researchers from King's are joined by collaborators from the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the University of Salford, and the London School of Economics.
As well as publishing widely in the academic press, the Unit runs a broad range of events which are open to all. We also disseminate via Bluesky (cross-posting on X, formerly Twitter), LinkedIn, and our YouTube channel. And see the Unit blog and our news page.
The Policy Research Unit's Senior Management Team brings together expertise from the Business School, the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care, and – beyond King's – from the Institute for Fiscal Studies. The Unit's Public Contributor Involvement and Engagement Advisory Group is chaired by Valerie Lipman. For the 2024-28 contract the Policy Research Unit also benefits from having a Workforce Panel, chaired by Lyn Romeo.
Go to our people pages.
19 August 2025
The Unit moves to Melbourne House in September
11 August 2025
Members of the Homelessness Lived Experience Standing Advisory Group were in Salford
18 July 2025
The 2024/25 report highlights our study on safeguarding and self-neglect
10
Sep
10 September 2025
Pippa Hockton; Carolin Hess
Featured research: Studies focusing on self-neglect / hoarding behaviours