The NIHR ARC East Midlands team are now able to share our implementation training booklets with you all.  4 booklets are available:

1. Implementation: Principles and Perspectives
2. Engagement, Involvement & Coproduction
3. Planning for Impact
4. Measuring & Evidencing Impact

Download free of charge here

‘Services impact carers differently than the people they care for and their views are just as important. The views of carers are important, could make a difference, and should be valued in health and social care research. However, research often overlooks these perspectives.

NIHR have just published a set of graphics to support the involvement of unpaid/family carers in health and social care research.

We hope our graphics will provide support for both researchers and carers to work together. One graphic focuses on the top tips for researchers involving carers in their work, the other focuses on top tips for carers who are considering becoming involved.’

‘Research colleagues with an interest in the care of older people and in particular those living in a care home setting, would like to share a new resource to support the engagement process for working in the care home sector.

This free, downloadable 2-sided A4 infographic is intended to be used by the research community to assist engagement with care homes, for researchers to consider and think about questions and responses and for care home managers to help them with requests to engage in research activities.

If you would like further details about this work or any of our other proposed tools for care home engagement please contact in the first instance Associate Professor Kathryn Hinsliff-Smith at De Montfort University.

The link to the resource can be found here Engaging in research with care homes | arc-em.nihr.ac.uk

This work was funded by ARC East Midlands based at The University of Nottingham.’

“Inspiring different teams to work together is key to the successful leadership of any integrated health and social care system (ICS). However, little is known about how effective leadership can be supported and improved.

In England, ICSs are bringing together local NHS services and working with social care systems, local authorities, communities, and other groups, each with their own motivations. Leaders of ICSs therefore may be managing several professional teams with different goals and accountabilities. The challenges are not the same as in managing a team of professionals working towards a single goal.

ICSs are being rolled out across the UK and will soon be the new model of healthcare delivery. They are designed to put the person at the centre of their care. But there is little research on how leadership works (the mechanisms of leadership), and what makes it successful.

Research into successful leadership in health and social care mostly focuses on single teams and their tasks. This new study explored leadership of complex integrated teams and systems across health and social care. Working with a range of service providers and users, carers and researchers, the team reviewed the published evidence. They identified 10 mechanisms (such as balancing different perspectives, or working appropriately with power) which could influence the success of ICS leadership.

The researchers then searched for papers which either did or did not support the importance of these mechanisms. This allowed them to describe the influence of these mechanisms on ICS leadership.

Overall, the researchers said there was a lack of evidence on ICS leadership. Most studies referred to simple models of leadership and did not explore more complex teams and systems. They generally assumed the necessary skills for leadership are the same. The researchers argue that this assumption is not valid and that more research is needed to understand how to successfully lead ICSs.”

To read more on this topic click here

Pre-Submission Review Panels are held monthly. Documents for each Panel will need to be submitted to us by 9am on either 14 February, 07 March, 18 April or 16 May 2022. If you would like your project to be reviewed, please email us as soon as possible (as availability for reviews is limited) and at least one week before the above dates to register your interest: rds-sc@soton.ac.uk

Please see the RDS South Central Pre-Submission Review Panel page for more information.

“Engaging in research is vital in addressing questions that arise in health and social care, producing new evidence and research to improve patient care. This is the third webinar in the Activating Research series, presented by NIHR ARC North Thames Academy, which are inspired by our Becoming Research Active in-person workshop.

This webinar is intended as an introduction to research planning and the support available. Our invited speakers will give three short presentations followed by a Q&A session:

Dr Jessica Sheringham will provide an overview of the NIHR ARC North Thames and the role of the Research Partnership Team (RPT) in the collaboration in designing responsive applied research.

Dr Peter Lovell will explain the assistance available to researchers from the NIHR Research Design Service (RDS) London through the various stages of research design and funding applications

Adeeba Asghar and Robert Pleass of the NIHR Clinical Research Network (CRN) North Thames will discuss the support available for delivering studies with the CRN in the North Thames region and the workplace development opportunities available.”

Thursday 20 May 2021, 11am-12pm

To register click here

The National Institute for Health Research are funding exciting new pre-doctoral opportunities for Local Authority and LA commissioned service based individuals.

Indicative timescales

“The NIHR Doctoral Fellowship funds individuals from a range of health and social care professions to undertake a PhD in an area of NIHR research.

The Fellowship funds:

• full salary support, including protected time to concentrate on research
• PhD fees and research costs
• a bespoke training and development programme to meet individual needs

Applicants from clinical or social care practice are able to include up to 20% clinical time as part of the Fellowship, to ensure the maintenance of their clinical competence whilst undertaking the Fellowship.

Full details of the remit of research funded by the NIHR and eligibility criteria can be found in the guidance notes.”

Click here for more details

• full salary support, including protected time to concentrate on research
• research costs
• a bespoke training and development programme to meet individual needs

The next Home Care Research Forum (HCRF) meeting will take place on Wednesday 25th November 2pm – 3.30pm. This will be a virtual forum using Zoom. 

“The following speakers are presenting at this event: 

• Dr Tushna Vandrevala & Dr Emma O’Dwyer (Kingston University) – Job satisfaction and well-being for live-in carers: Why we need to start thinking about their personal identity
• Alex Thomas and Diana Jablonskyte (Saint Michael’s Hospice) – Hospice at home service

This event is free and open to all, however, booking is essential. If you would like to attend please e-mail laura.cole@kcl.ac.uk  to book a place and receive the Zoom link.”

Please tweet using #hcrf @adalinecole