University Master's Degree in Clinical Research (Online) University Master’s Degree in Clinical Research (Online) - Official
1. Official degree
This is an officially recognised degree that allows you to work in any European Union member state.
2. Access to a PhD
You will be able to advance your doctoral thesis with the research study you choose for the master’s degree.
3. Master 100% online
It adapts to your work and professional life.
4. Applied research
You will find new approaches to deal with future changes to the healthcare system through the use of applied research methodologies.
5. Guided and directed content
All the content is guided and directed by the teaching staff, which you will have at your disposal to answer questions at all times.
6. Networking
You will be able to generate a network through the sharing of workshops and projects. Also available in asynchronous format.
Agreement with the University of Turku - Finland
We have an agreement with the University of Turku that allows an international stay.
Additional information
Presentation
This programme is aimed at medical professionals who are looking to conduct research, build on their scientific knowledge and make use of scientific evidence. It provides tuition on research methodologies for health professionals that want to conduct research in hospitals, primary care centres, institutes or research centres, social healthcare centres or healthcare centres (among others); undertake a doctoral degree and/or continue a career in academia.
Objectives
- To assess planning and health outcomes, comorbidity and social contexts by looking at different healthcare demands.
- To design, analyse and apply the necessary techniques and methods to carry out research in their clinical field, and interpret clinical, epidemiological and health outcomes research undertaken using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies.
- To promote lines of research oriented towards vocational practice and/or which serve as a basis for doctoral studies or access to the doctoral programme.
- To gain knowledge and skills in research methodologies in order to apply them in both the teaching and academic sphere and the professional healthcare world.
- To develop skills necessary to disseminate knowledge generated in the scientific community.
- To ensure students are equipped to sign job contracts for research positions and pre-doctoral grants.
Prospective students
Graduate in Nursing, Pharmacy, Physiotherapy, speech Therapy, Medicine, Human Nutrition and Dietetics, Podiatry and Psychology (or equivalent degree) .
What will each professional profile gain from this programme:
- Nurses: This master’s degree provides students with the methodological tools they need for research, scientific interpretation and implementation of results and interventions. It also trains nurses in critical scientific thinking, thus fostering the evolution of the profession and the advancement of knowledge. This master’s degree transforms students’ way of working by enhancing their attention to detail and improving health outcomes. Training in quantitative and qualitative design ensures that people and patients are at the centre of our mission, which, as well as helping students predict variables and results, allows them an insight into how the person receiving care experience their illness. Lessons on systematic revision also ensure students can accurately analyse scientific evidence and have the capacity to reach documented conclusions based on previous studies.
- Physiotherapists: The master’s degree in clinical research is an important qualification for physiotherapists as it provides them with tools for interpreting scientific evidence and transferring the most effective results to clinical practice. It also teaches students about scientific methodology that will give them the skills they need to carry out research in healthcare, access a doctoral programme and work in academia in the world of teaching and research. It is a comprehensive master’s degree for students looking to acquire knowledge on designing quantitative and qualitative research methods, helping them to explore and understand how patients experience injury, degenerative diseases or cardiac rehabilitation, from the patient's own point of view. Additional training in instrument design and validation will help students ensure that the data they have collected is accurate and valid.
- Doctors: This master’s degree gives students the knowledge and research skills they need to succeed in the field of clinical research. It offers a structured and systematic learning process in which doctors acquire the research skills they need to carry out research in their specialisation. One piece of feedback we receive from doctors is that this master’s degree has given them the confidence not only to accurately interpret scientific evidence, but also to launch their own clinical studies.
- Psychologists: Clinical psychology is a relatively young scientific discipline that has grown a great deal over recent years. It requires clinical psychologists to consult scientific literature and know how to interpret results. In practice, clinical psychology must be based on evidence, which requires professionals to know how to find the most relevant literature and undertake critical reading and thinking of published articles.
Clinical psychology needs to adapt therapies designed in other countries to fit our sociocultural context and demonstrate their effectiveness, which can only be done through clinical research.
The evolution and growth of the field of clinical psychology is only possible because clinical psychologists dedicate time to researching and publishing articles on new therapies that could be more effective than existing models.
Academic Accreditation
A University Master's Degree in Clinical Research qualification from the Universidad Internacional de Catalunya.
Directors and Coordinators
- Dr Albert Gallart Fernandez-Puebla
Assistant Director of the Department of Nursing and Director of the Master's degree in Clinical Research. Holder of a PhD in Human Ageing from UIC Barcelona. Master's degree in Nursing Services Management. Degrees in Nursing and Humanities.
Academic Commitee
- Dr Encarna Rodríguez Higueras
Director of Nursing at UIC Barcelona, specialist in Clinical Simulation, Master’s Degree in Research. - Dr Laia Wennberg Capellas
Master's Degree in Public Health, expert in Healthcare Ethics. - Dr Blanca Goñi Fusté
Master’s Degree in Public Health and coordinator of the final Master's Degree projects. - Dr Albert Gallart Fernández-Puebla
Director of the Master's Degree in Clinical Research at UIC Barcelona, Master's Degree in Health Management and principal researcher of the Consolidated Research Group in Health Education recognised by the Generalitat de Catalunya.
Prerequisites & admissions
Necessary Documentation
Any candidate wishing to secure a place on the programme must submit the following documentation:
- Application form, common to all programmes, duly completed
- A personal mission statement written by the applicants themselves describing their personal motivation and the professional and academic objectives leading them to apply for a place on the course
- An official academic record of university studies completed if coming from another university
- Curriculum vitae of the applicant
- A certified copy of the academic qualifications of the applicant
Admission criteria
Entrance exams consist of a weighted assessment of candidates' professional and research records, their level of English and a personal interview with one of the members of the Master's Academic Committee.
Professional practice and experience will be evaluated as well as knowledge of English (level equivalent to B1). If no certification is available, students will have their level tested through the languages service of the university.
Once the admission process is completed, the Information and Admissions Service, which is responsible for managing exams, will advise each candidate of their results.
Means of entry
All candidates who comply with the means of entry and general requirements can apply for admission to the qualification. Degrees that give access to a Master's course are: Nursing, physiotherapy, medicine, psychology, occupational therapy, speech therapy and other degrees relating to health sciences. The recommended profile for the entrant is a healthcare professional who carries out research in hospitals, primary care centres, institutes and research centres, etc., or healthcare professionals and nurses who wish to gain a doctorate and follow an academic career and who display the following attributes:
- Team player
- Interpersonal communication
- Ability to adapt to change
- Organisation and planning
- Creativity and innovation
- Motivated to achieve quality
- Discipline, memory and dedication
- Critical spirit, methodical, ordered and systematic
- Tolerant, responsible, respectful and ethical attitude
- Adept at decision-making
- Self-sufficientv
Transfers regulations
If you would like information on the regulations governing transfers, click on the following link:
Grants & financial aid
Grants
The university does not offer grants for third cycle studies. In order to obtain financial aid for your studies you must contact institutions outside the university.
Doctorate
Lines of Research
Line 1: palliative care for end of life and chronic illness. Communication with patients
Objectives:
- Study of the biological and psychological factors that lead patients to want to die.
- Develop models of diagnosis and of accompaniment and treatment, for the patients and for their family.
- Develop learning models to train professionals.
Line 2: health education
Objectives:
- Health Education, aimed at improving knowledge of health and its population factors and training future health professionals as educators in health.
- Health Science Education, aimed at improving the training of future health professionals to achieve professional excellence in both their technical competencies and in their interpersonal, self-management, prioritisation, decision-making and inter-professional skills.
Line 3: translational, clinical and applied research
Objectives:
- Apply in clinical practice the biomedical, basic sciences and/or experimental knowledge acquired in the laboratory, with the aim of improving health care.
- Understand the mechanisms of disease, as well as the demographic, epidemiologic, and/or socio-economic factors that influence it, in addition to its clinical characteristics, diagnostic procedures and/or therapeutic, prognostic factors and/or preventive measures.
- Analyse best practices in terms of activity, quality, safety, efficiency and satisfaction, at care, professional, organisational, institutional levels and/or as regards the health system itself, as well as in the field of public health and/or health policies.
Line 4: infectious diseases: prevention, diagnosis and treatment
Objectives:
- Study scientific progress and establish medical improvements in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of infectious diseases.
- Study the interrelationship and translation of the various infectious diseases.
- Improve the general patient health, reducing the risk of infections and inflammatory diseases.
Line 5: study of health determinants
Objectives:
- Characterise the determinants of the health of local populations.
- Assess the health policies implemented
- Develop public health policies for primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary prevention to reduce the impact of non-communicable diseases in the population.
- Find new biological markers for the correct characterisation of health determinants.
Line 6: physiotherapy assessments and performance in controlling movement
Objectives:
- To analyse the mechanisms of assessment and performance of physiotherapy in the processes involved in control and execution of movement.
Line 7: bioengineering and regenerative medicine
Objectives:
- Interlink multidisciplinary concepts from several areas such as biology, chemistry, materials science, physics and medicine to develop medical devices that can improve the regeneration or replacement of damaged organs.
- Understand and study the interactions between the medical devices designed and living tissue.
- Learn experimental methodologies and techniques in the field of Bioengineering and Regenerative Medicine.
Line 8: neuroscience research
Objectives:
- The molecular, cellular and physiological study of neurons and their integration in the organism as a whole.
- Neuronal control of energy homeostasis and the prevention of obesity.
- AMPA glutamate receptor transport and its role in cognition.
- Molecular basis of hereditary spastic paraplegia.
- Regulation of axonal transport by nutrients.
- Functional imaging in vivo of brain circuits for sensory, predictive and attention processing
- Plasticity of cortical brain circuits.
- Dysfunctionality of neuronal circuits in psychiatric illness.
Line 9: research in cell physiology and hereditary haematologic diseases
Objective:
- A team consisting of biologists with the objective of studying various issues related to the field of cell physiology.
- Control of the cell cycle of Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
- Analysis of the role played by new cyclins in relation to tumours.
- Cellular response to the limitation of nutrients.
- Genetic diagnosis of iron metabolism disorders and other hereditary haematologic diseases.
International mobility
Master's students have the opportunity to take part in the international course Empowering Learning Environments in Nursing Education (EleneIP), in Finland.
This is a European project that forms part of the Erasmus Lifelong Learning Programme. The four participating universities are the University of Turku (Finland), Klaipeda University (Lithuania), Cyprus University of Technology (Cyprus) and the UIC.
The EleneIP brings together students and academic staff from different countries that seek to ensure a high-quality education.
The aims of the course are mainly to unify nurse education in Europe and explore new e-learning environments, especially in social media.
There is also the option of taking the educational programme of the European Academy of Nursing Science (EANS): The Academy is a European scientific community that provides inspiration, collaboration, and academic leadership, through research and academic achievement in the pursuit of excellence. Students can attend once they have completed the Master’s and have entered the PhD programme.
Final master's degree project
The Final Master’s Degree project (“TFM”) is the name given to one of the compulsory subjects included in the University Master's Degree in Clinical Research.
The TFM is worth 15 ECTS credits, which is equivalent to 330 hours per student, and covers all the tasks relating to the search for data and preliminary information, programming, planning and structuring of contents, organisation and development.
The TFM will be carried out individually by each student, who will be tutored and accompanied by a lecturer-tutor who guides them in the process. For this purpose, individual tutorials and/or cooperative working groups will be organised to help students to integrate the theoretical and practical teaching delivered throughout the course.
The student must show that they are able to describe and analyse the problem to be investigated, based on prior scientific research and background, through the programming of research objectives and design, suitable applications and the development of scientific method, as well as establishing the methodology for evaluation of the results.
Both the development and the assessment of the TFM will be supervised by the Master’s Academic Committee, comprising lecturers from the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences.
The Master’s Academic Committee is responsible for:
- Assigning a tutor according to the subject and number of students.
- Proposal and appointment of TFM defence panellists.
- Development of assessment rubrics and consensus of criteria.
- Submitting a proposal for TFM defence.
- Ensure the competency-based assessment process and the acquisition of competencies by students.
