Martin Eccles is Professor of Clinical Effectiveness and the William Leach Professor of Primary Care Research at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK where he runs the Clinical Effectiveness research programme. The overall aim of the programme is to improve patient outcomes through receiving appropriate healthcare and covers four areas: systematic reviews; hypothesis generating studies; hypothesis testing studies (usually randomised controlled trials of interventions to promote the uptake of research evidence into practice); and the exploration of theory relevant to this area, in order to better understand clinician behaviour and design interventions to promote change. He has published widely on implementation issues.