Our future health: A new UK health research programme

Last week I walked into Boots  and, after giving some physical measurements, including my blood pressure and cholesterol levels, I gave a blood sample to be part of the Our Future Health initiative. Our Future Health (https://ourfuturehealth.org.uk/)  is set to become the UK’s largest health research programme ever. With the aim of recruiting five million volunteers across the country, it aims to revolutionise the way we detect, prevent and treat disease.

The breadth, depth and detail of Our Future Health makes it a world-leading resource. The data collected could hold the key to a wide range of health discoveries, such as:

  • Identifying early signals to detect disease much earlier.
  • Accurately predicting who is at higher risk of disease.
  • Developing better interventions and more effective treatments and technologies.

How’s it going so far?

Since the start of recruitment in July 2022 (delyed because of Covid), the programme has recruited over one million participants where:

  • Over 1.19 million participants have completed the baseline health questionnaire.
  • 330,058 participants have had their genetic data analysed (genotyped).
  • Nearly 1 million participants have linked health records, including cancer-related data.

This data will be carefully collated to reflect the UK’s diverse population, with plans to expand recruitment nationwide.

What data will be collected?

Researchers accessing Our Future Health will have a wealth of information at their fingertips:

  • Participant data: basic registration, consent and demographic details.
  • Questionnaire data: self-reported health information plus details of household, socio-economic status, education, employment and family health history.
  • Genotype array data: genetic data from blood samples, including single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) information. – Linked health records: including NHS data and death records from the Office for National Statistics (ONS)

All the data are stored securely and can be accessed only by researchers from universities, charities, the NHS and companies involved in health research – giving them the opportunity to discover and test more effective ways to predict, detect and treat major diseases, where researchers can access it to make ground-breaking discoveries.

So if you’re 18 or over and live in the UK, why not get involved? It’s a chance to help shape the future of healthcare for generations to come.

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