Sharon Westcar

I joined the Nuffield Department of Women’s & Reproductive Health in 2024, responsible for leadership and management of the Clinical Research Group. I am a research nurse with over 20 years of experience managing teams and delivering commercial and academic CTIMP (Clinical Trial of an Investigational Medicinal Product), medical device, medical procedure, and observational clinical trials in primary and secondary care settings.

I trained as a paediatric nurse. Before research I nursed both in the UK and internationally mainly in paediatric ED but have also worked in neonatal intensive care and paediatric infectious diseases.

I transitioned into research with the Oxford Vaccine Group in 2004 where I received an excellent foundation in the research process. In 2010 I moved to the Children’s Hospital, Oxford to expand the team and portfolio of studies, including coordinating the UK Chimes (The UK Childhood Meningitis and Encephalitis) study, which recruited over 3000 children in under 4 years in 31 hospitals. Utilizing the UK Chimes study as a launchpad I moved to a regional role in 2013 to establish children’s research in all the DGHs across the Thames Valley.

I managed the Women and Children’s research team at the Royal Berkshire Hospital for 7 years from 2017, overseeing rapid growth in the size of the team and significantly increasing the number of studies conducted. I was seconded as the regional research delivery manager for the Harmonie study (nirsevimab versus no intervention in preventing hospitalizations due to respiratory syncytial virus in infants) in 11 sites, hospitals, GPs, and South-Central Ambulance service from 2022-2023.

I facilitate the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Valid Informed Consent and Principal Investigator GCP training and I am Reproductive Health and Childbirth National Research Champion for the Thames Valley and South Midlands.