Recruitment to the ground-breaking Born in Bradford (BiB) health research project is now complete – thanks to the generous support of families in Bradford.

On Christmas Eve the last women will be invited to join the project and the recruitment office will close its doors.

The original target of 10,000 babies was reached in February and the study has been so popular and successful that by Christmas Eve nearly 14,000 mothers and their infants will have been enrolled.

This represents about 60 per cent of all women who have had their babies at Bradford Royal Infirmary since recruitment began in March, 2007.

BiB researchers will now track the babies over the next 20 years to adulthood so doctors can learn more about how to improve the health of people living in Bradford and elsewhere.

Born in Bradford director Professor John Wright said: “Four years ago we launched Born in Bradford more in hope than expectation.

“When we started we worried that we would struggle to recruit 1,000 families let alone 10,000 families. We now have priceless information about the clues to finding out about health and disease from nearly 14,000 families.

“Over the coming years we will be able to piece together these clues to find out what aspects of daily life and lifestyle choices people make that might contribute to childhood and adult illness and how we can improve the health of the people of Bradford.

“The study has attracted a huge amount of interest from all over the world, but more importantly from all across the city where support has been overwhelming – we should have called the study Brilliant in Bradford.”

Lead research midwife Dagmar Waiblinger, who ran the recruitment office, said: “It really is the end of an era. I can hardly believe that nearly 14,000 women have volunteered to be part of this important medical research study.

“It has been an amazing journey and a real achievement for the research team who have worked so hard over the last three years.”

Sameera Ali, a study administrator who has been with Born in Bradford since recruitment began, said: “There has been so much goodwill from the mothers and their partners who have given up their valuable time to provide BiB with a wealth of data.”