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What you can expect from UK LLC when starting a project in their Trusted Research Environment 

Joseph Lam

1st Jul 2025

In this blog, health data scientist and researcher Joseph Lam, shares his experience of working in the UK LLC Trusted Research Environment and the support received as a user. Joseph’s PhD involves assessing and evaluating data linkage strategies to reduce linkage bias by ethnicity, and improve data equity for missed populations. He is hoping to shed light on and suggest alternatives to the practices in data linkage that might lead to biases that disproportionately exclude marginalised communities, such as people from minority ethnic groups, in health research. Joseph is based at University College London.

Exceptional user support, every step of the way 

The first thing that worries people about working in a Trusted Research Environment (TRE) is the steep learning curve – somehow all TREs are meticulously designed in a way that perfectly differs from other TREs! Jokes aside, the UK LLC TRE is nothing short of exceptional when it comes to preparing new users to use the platform. Apart from the typical documentations you would expect, the UK LLC team provides a series of introductory videos that guides us through every step of setting up. The example Jupyter Notebook serves as a template for my own project. This makes navigating datasets and running analyses (relatively) straightforward, which liberates me from wrestling with complex technical processes, and enables me to focus on the research itself. 

Comprehensive tools deliver exactly what you need 

The UK LLC team does not throw you straight into the deep end in waves of longitudinal data. The constantly updated UK LLC Guidebook covers everything you need to know from software packages available, details of each linked dataset, to documentations required in your written output. The UK LLC Explore tool made it much easier to look for relevant constructs and variables across longitudinal cohorts. The forum and regular meetings allow you to share common struggles and borrow code from other users. The community is still small but is growing for sure!  

A ready-made network to connect with and learn from  

The support offered by the UK LLC team is one of its standout features. From initial onboarding to troubleshooting queries, staff are readily available and approachable. I appreciate the monthly meetings where users get to ask technical or methodological questions directly. These meetings are an enjoyable opportunity to network with colleagues and seeing others’ progress in real-time keeps me motivated and helps spark new ideas. The direct support from UK LLC means I feel confident in my work, knowing help is only a call or email away.  

UK LLC sets a high bar 

The platform’s user-centred design, dedicated support, and vibrant community all come together to enhance the quality of research and overall experience. I look forward to watching the environment evolve even further, continuing to set a high bar for secure and user-friendly data analysis! 

For more information about working in the UK LLC TRE read Guidebook.