REF 2021: Medicine contributes to Cambridge’s top position in “Clinical Medicine”
The University of Cambridge has scored top position in the country in clinical medicine, the latest results from the Research Excellence Framework (REF) reveal. Used by the government to guide their funding decisions, the REF results are the culmination of an exhaustive process designed to quantify the quality, impact and output of research done by UK Universities.
With a GPA (Grade Point Average) of 3.63, Clinical Medicine increased its 2014 score (3.43), as well as improving its position nationwide from second to first. GPA is the most prestigious metric within the REF review, reflecting research quality per researcher, and so this metric publicly recognises the quality of the researchers and the research that is carried out in Cambridge.
One hundred members of the Department of Medicine had their research contributions assessed as part of Unit of Assessment 1 (Clinical Medicine), making Medicine the largest contributor to the 363 Cambridge investigators returned.
Cambridge ranked 3rd in ‘Research Power’, based on 363 FTE researcher submissions, compared to University of Oxford ranked 1st and Imperial College London 2nd, but who both entered submissions from larger numbers of researchers (498 and 439 respectively).
Three Department members were returned in other Units of Assessment, which also performed well.
“This is a terrific result. It is a credit to those who put the return together (admirably led by Richard Gilbertson, Andrew McCaskie and others), and in particular to the Department as a whole – researchers at all levels, and the hard-working admin and support staff that underpin them. It is a very public acknowledgment of your hard work and relentless focus on quality that has characterised the Department in recent years, and also of the positive impact that work has on the rest of the community.”
Professor Ken Smith, Head of the Department of Medicine
School of Clinical Medicine REF 2021
https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/REF-2021
