Stay involved
Being involved
There are lots of ways that you are already contributing to UK Biobank to advance health research and many ways you can stay involved. The key is to ensure that the contact details we have for you are accurate and up-to-date. Providing us with your email address (if you have one) is a great way to stay in touch and helps us keep our costs down. You can check and update your contact details through the participant website (you will need your nine-digit participant number found on all our communication with you).
Our participant website will be shut down for essential maintenance on the first Wednesday of each month between 8am and 9am.
We apologise for any inconvenience.
Find out about the impact of your altruism, time and effort in The Times
Read the 2023/24 Newsletter
Catch up on the milestones and achievements that you have helped UK Biobank to reach in the 2023/24 newsletter, including our exciting release of whole genome sequencing data on 500k.
Find out about genetics research conducted all over the world, the impact of our imaging study and the release of data on 3,000 proteins - all thanks to you.
Read on to see how you can contribute further to UK Biobank and how we keep your data safe.
We send the annual newsletter to all participants and you will receive a copy by email or by post if we do not have a valid email address for you. Please do let us know an email address if you have one.
We hope that you enjoy reading the stories in this issue of the newsletter.
Rory Cellan-Jones on the importance of linking GP data to UK Biobank
"Imagine a huge database containing the health records of half a million people who had agreed to undergo all sorts of tests and be tracked over time. That would be an invaluable resource for researchers trying to discover new ways of treating life-threatening diseases or planning how to confront a pandemic. Sounds great doesn’t it? Well it’s not a fantasy - it exists and it’s called UK Biobank.
When I wrote of the challenges in getting this kind of medical data sharing project off the ground I knew vaguely about the Biobank but had no idea of its scale. What I also didn’t know was that this was another example of the endless struggles to get hold of primary care data for use in research - and one all the more frustrating because those half a million participants have all given explicit consent for that to happen."
Catch up on participant events about the UK Biobank imaging study
Click on the buttons below to watch on-demand content from UK Biobank participant events discussing the importance of the imaging study.
UK Biobank imaging project: what to expect & how it's advancing health research
Participant event about the value of GP data
There has been a lot of confusion in the media about NHS Digital’s plan – called the General Practice Data for Planning and Research (GPDPR) – to add GP patient records to all of the other medical data that are already available centrally in the NHS for approved research and to improve health care.
Thanks to your participation in UK Biobank, and that of 500,000 other people from around the UK, an enormous amount is being learnt about how best to prevent and treat many different kinds of disabling and life-threatening diseases.
This research depends on our ability to access information about health outcomes that occur among UK Biobank participants through linkage to NHS medical record systems in accordance with the consent that you gave us when you first agreed to participate in UK Biobank.
We hosted a virtual participant event on the 18th of August 2021 from 2pm to 3pm. Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, previous Chair of the Royal College of GPs, joined other esteemed experts to help explain what is happening with GPDPR and were available to answer questions from the audience. Click on the button below to watch on-demand content from this event.
Serology participant event
The UK Biobank Coronavirus Serology Study: Participant event took a deep dive into our 6 month Serology project. On demand content from this interactive evening and further information are available by clicking on the button below.
UK Biobank's Principal Investigator wins MRC's Millennium Medal 2020
Chief Executive and Principal Investigator of UK Biobank, Professor Sir Rory Collins, has won the Medical Research Council's Millennium Medal 2020. Watch his full interview with Sarah Trenfield, Strategic Stakeholder Engagement Manager at the MRC, in which Rory shares highlights from his career. You can also click on the button below to read the full blog post.
Latest feature
Interview with Scientia
UK Biobank's Principal Investigator, Professor Sir Rory Collins, was asked to partake in an exclusive interview with Scientia magazine for their health and medicine issue. Click on the button below to read about some of UK Biobank's achievements, as well as the ambitious and unique potential of this exciting project.
Participant events
We host in-person events every year for you to find out more about the work of UK Biobank. Events offer you the chance to meet some of the scientists using our data and to ask questions.
With 500,000 participants we have to do this via invitation only, but we run some of these events online. You can view previous event videos on our YouTube channel.
Join us on Twitter
You can keep up to date on the latest developments and research findings from UK Biobank via our Twitter feed.
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