Marie Curie have launched their first Research Impact Report for 2014/15 , showcasing the outputs of the research they fund, and how this investment is helping to improve palliative and end of life care for people with any terminal illness, their carers, friends and families.

» Read the Research Impact Report (Marie Curie webpage)

As shown in a recent report analysing Marie Curie’s spend on palliative and end of life care research in the NCRI Cancer Research Database, palliative and end of life care is an under represented area of research. Marie Curie scaled up funding for palliative and end of life care research in 2010, through their research centres, research lead programme in Marie Curie Hospices, and their open and competitive funding streams. The Research Impact Report highlights the impact of this investment on policy and practice which, as the largest charitable funder of research in the UK in this area, is so important to the people they support.

» Read the report analysing Marie Curie’s spend on palliative and end of life care research (PDF)

Achievements so far

In 2014/15, researchers funded by Marie Curie produced 70 papers that were published in peer-reviewed journals – their highest annual total ever.

Data collected from over 18,800 health records has helped inform palliative and end of life care research projects and provide recommendation for policy. For example, research funded by Marie Curie and led by researchers at Kings College London, is using data to investigate how patterns in where children and young people die have changed over time – an area that has never been evaluated at the national level.

Looking ahead

Marie Curie are working to double their investment in research in palliative and end of life care for all conditions – cancer and non-cancer, and encourage investment by other funders in this important area too.