Research | Joint Action

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As well as the human cost of pain and suffering, musculoskeletal disorders are the most common cause of illness in the UK affecting over 8.5 million people and are responsible for in excess of 11 million lost working days at a cost to society, in 2007 prices of over £7 billion. It is the sixth-largest area of NHS expenditure, at over £3.3 billion annually and accounts for over 30% of patients who visit their GPs.

Joint Action was established by the BOA to lead in the process of developing the research base in UK orthopaedics and harnessing it systematically to address all current and future musculoskeletal needs. Research that the Department of Health does not consider ‘an area of national priority’, currently working out at considerably less than 2% - 3% of the total annual UK research budget.

Our main driver is, as it has always been, the burden of musculoskeletal disease as it affects our patients in the UK.

Our research programme has been devised by the eminent BOA Research Committee. Following extensive discussion with other leading orthopaedic professional bodies, in 2005 they published the Research Agenda.

This document maps out the direction of research needed in six priority areas of orthopaedic medicine. It provides the focus and impetus for our fundraising efforts.

This, in turn has caused Joint Action to become the only UK charity that specialises in raising and distributing funds for all areas of the musculoskeletal spectrum.

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