Category / international

Migration & health research in Middle East & Malaysia

international, Publishing, writing

Yesterday the Journal of Immigrant and Minority Health published the final version of Dr. Pratik Adhikary’s paper ‘Workplace Accidents Among Nepali Male Workers in the Middle East and Malaysia: A Qualitative Study’ [1].  This is the fourth paper originating from Pratik’s Ph.D. research conducted in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences, the first three papers appeared in the period 2011-2018 [2-4].

The paper highlights that many Nepali men work in the Middle East and Malaysia and media reports and anecdotal evidence suggests they are at a high risk of workplace-related accidents and injuries for male Nepali workers.   Pratik’s Ph.D. study used face-to-face interviews to explore the personal experiences of twenty male Nepali migrants of unintentional injuries at their place of work.  His study found that almost half of study participants experienced work-related accident abroad. The Participants suggested that the reasons behind this are not only health and safety at work but also poor communication, taking risks by workers themselves, and perceived work pressure. Some participants experienced serious incidents causing life-long disability, extreme and harrowing accounts of injury but received no support from their employer or host countries.

The paper concludes that Nepali migrant workers are at a high risk of occupational injuries owing to a number of interrelated factors poor health and safety at work, pressure of work, risk taking practices, language barriers, and their general work environment. Both the Government of Nepal and host countries need to be better policing   existing policies; introduce better legislation where necessary; ensure universal health (insurance) coverage for labour migrants; and improve preventive measures to minimize the number and severity of accidents and injuries among migrant workers.

 

References:

  1. Adhikary P, van Teijlingen E., Keen S. (2019) Workplace accidents among Nepali male workers in the Middle East and Malaysia: A qualitative study, Journal of Immigrant & Minority Health 21(5): 1115–1122. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10903-018-0801-y
  2. Adhikary P., Keen S., van Teijlingen E (2011) Health Issues among Nepalese migrant workers in Middle East. Health Science Journal 5: 169-75. www.hsj.gr/volume5/issue3/532.pdf
  3. Adhikary, P, Sheppard, Z., Keen, S., van Teijlingen, E. (2017) Risky work: accidents among Nepalese migrant workers in Malaysia, Qatar & Saudi Arabia, Health Prospect 16(2): 3-10.
  4. Adhikary P, Sheppard, Z., Keen S., van Teijlingen E. (2018) Health and well-being of Nepalese migrant workers abroad, International Journal of Migration, Health & Social Care 14(1): 96-105.  https://doi.org/10.1108/IJMHSC-12-2015-0052

 

BMC blog on latest HSS paper

international, open access, PG research, Publishing, writing

Dr. Rachel Arnold’s recent paper in BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth was highlighted in a blog promoted by the publisher.  The paper ‘Villains or victims? An ethnography of Afghan maternity staff and the challenge of high quality respectful care‘ reports on the everyday lives of maternal healthcare providers working in a tertiary maternity hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan (1). BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth is an Open Access journal so the paper is available free of charge to anybody in Afghanistan (and elsewhere) with an internet connection.  The aim was to understand the staff’s notions of care, their varying levels of commitment to providing care for women in childbirth, and the obstacles and dilemmas that affected standards, and thereby gain insight into their contributions to respectful maternity care, whether as ‘villains’ or as ‘victims.’

Dr. Arnold is Postdoctoral Midwifery Researcher in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH).  This is the third paper from Rachel’s excellent PhD project, the previous two papers appeared in BJOG and Social Science & Medicine (2-3).

Click here for BMC Blog post:

Villains or victims? The role of maternity staff in decreasing or enhancing respectful care

Reference:

  1. Arnold, R., van Teijlingen, E., Ryan, K., Holloway, I. (2019) Villains or victims? An ethnography of Afghan maternity staff and the challenge of high quality respectful care, BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 19 :307 https://rdcu.be/bPqlj
  2. Arnold R., van Teijlingen E, Ryan K., Holloway I. (2015) Understanding Afghan health care providers: Qualitative study of culture of care in Kabul maternity hospital, BJOG 122: 260-267.
  3. Arnold, R., van Teijlingen, E., Ryan, K., Holloway, I. (2018) Parallel worlds: an ethnography of care in an Afghan maternity hospital, Social Science & Medicine 126:33-40.

 

Save the date – 18 November 2019 – UKRO Annual Visit to BU

Funding opportunities, international

As usual, RDS will host annual UK Research Office visit to BU in 2019. This year’s event has been scheduled for November; the reason is obvious – Brexit. All academic staff interested in EU funding are invited to attend the event starting from noon.

Provisionally, the event will take place in FG04 seminar room; sessions will be delivered by Dr Andreas Kontogeorgos, European Advisor of the UK Research Office.
Agenda will include such topics as post-Brexit situation, remaining Horizon 2020 calls available for UK’s researchers in 2020 and development of the next EU framework programme Horizon Europe.

More information on agenda will be provided in early November. Academics are welcome to submit any other EU funding related topics for discussion to Ainar Blaudums at RDS Funding Development Team by the end of October.

UKRO delivers subscription-based advisory service for research organisations and provides MSCA and ERC National Contact Point services in the UK. As part of UKRO services, BU members of staff may sign up to receive personalised email alerts and get early access to EU funding related publications on UKRO portal.

The second wave of UKRI Fund for International Collaboration launched

Funding opportunities, international

The second wave of UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI) Fund for International Collaboration (FIC) has been announced on Friday 9 August 2019. The Fund for International Collaboration aims to enhance the UK’s excellence in research and innovation through global engagement, forging new bilateral and multilateral research and innovation programmes with global partners.

The thirteen partnerships, supported with £60 million from UKRI and at least £45 million in matched partner funding with additional in-kind support, will see UK researchers working with collaborators in ten countries, including the USA, Canada, Japan and India.

Announcement and summaries of programmes are available on UKRI web portal; research topics include:

  • The Changing North Atlantic Ocean and its Impact on Climate (partner country – USA; lead/partner UKRI council – NERC)
  • Understanding and adapting to a changing environment (Canada; NERC)
  • Next generation transdisciplinary international research collaborations in Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Diseases (USA, Israel, China; BBSRC)
  • Diabetes Partnership Initiative (Canada; MRC)
  • Healthy Ageing Flagship Challenge (China; ESRC, Innovate UK)
  • Built Environment and Prevention Research Scheme (Australia; MRC)
  • Joint Call on Artificial Intelligence and Society (Japan; ESRC, AHRC)
  • Collaboration on Artificial Intelligence: Building competitive, resilient economies and societies (Canada; ESRC, AHRC, EPSRC, MRC)
  • Globalink Doctoral Exchange Scheme (Canada; NERC on behalf of seven UKRI councils)
  • Digital transformation in humanities research (Ireland; AHRC)  and a few other topics

Specific calls are announced and more details provided by dedicated Research Councils. Announcement also contains summaries of the FIC Wave 1 projects funded through the UKRI-JSPS call.

For further support and assistance please refer to your RDS research facilitator.

UUKi sub-Saharan Africa Policy Network update

Funding opportunities, international

UUKi sub-Saharan Africa Policy Network

The next UUKi sub-Saharan Policy Network will take place at Woburn House, London on Wednesday 18 September, 1400 – 1630. The meeting will include a focus upon student recruitment in the region and will also include an update from the HMG cross Whitehall Africa Strategy team. Other speakers will be confirmed over the next couple of weeks. If you haven’t already, please do sign up via Eventbrite. https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/uuki-sub-saharan-africa-network-tickets-63104694841

 

Promoting Nursing CPD in Nepal

Fusion, international, writing

Bournemouth University facilitated a Strategic planning meeting to develop a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) Framework for Nepal last week in Kathmandu. The planning meeting was held on 30th July 2019 at the Institute of Medicine IOM Maharajgunj Nursing Campus.  Midwifery is not formally recognised in Nepal, i.e. as a profession separate from nursing, therefore when refer to nursing CPD in this blog we mean both ‘nurses’ and ‘nurse-midwives’.

Bournemouth University is collaborating in this project with Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) in the UK, the IOM Nursing Campus, the Nursing Association of Nepal (NAN), MIDSON, the Nepal Nursing Council (NNC) and several other key stakeholders in Nepal to support nursing regulatory bodies to establish mandatory CPD and/or post-registration training programmes relevant to their current practice in nursing. 

The Bournemouth team (led by Dr. Bibha Simkhada with Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen and Dr.Pramod Regmi) argued that CPD offers nurses the opportunity to maintain, improve and broaden knowledge, expertise and develop their personal and professional qualities to enhance practice and career development. Nepal has had limited process and progress in ensuring CPD for nurses and the uptake of post-registration education and training  programmes or CPD tends to be ad hoc.  Generally, CPD in Nepal remains under-developed as showing evidence of having received CPD is not currently a requirement of nurses when they re-register every five year.

This project is a good example of a BU FUSION project as our earlier Research in the form of a needs assessment will to the introduction of CPD which is of course, post-registration Education in nursing, helping to improve Practice in a low-income country.  We think we have had at least some impact on nursing in Nepal as the general feeling of our strategic planning meeting positive towards introducing CPD in the near future in Nepal.

 

 

BU PhD student Peter Wolfensberger has article accepted in Brit J Mental Health Nursing

Centre for Excellence in Learning, international, PG research, Publishing, student research, writing

Congratulations to FHSS PhD student Peter Wolfensberger whose article ‘Uncertainty in illness among people living with mental ill health – a mental health nursing perspective’ was accepted yesterday by the British Journal of Mental Health Nursing [1].   The paper introduces the concept of ‘uncertainty in illness’, which is a well-known concept in health care literature  and a considerable volume of research has investigated how people adapt to different health conditions and how the concept of uncertainty in illness relates to those populations. However, while there is substantial literature focusing on coping strategies and personal recovery, there is a paucity of research about uncertainty in illness among people living with mental ill health. 

This paper therefore, explores uncertainty in illness among mental health nurses and to provide an understanding of its relevance to people living with mental ill health.  The paper concludes that even though mental health nursing does not directly address uncertainty, the concept and its implications need to be considered and raised further among mental health professionals in order to improve support for people living with mental ill health in their process of personal recovery.

This paper originated from Peter’s PhD research on insights into mental health nursing in Switzerland, which has had input from Prof Fran Biley (before he passed away) and Dr. Zoe Sheppard (before she moved to her new job in Dorchester).  His current BU supervisors are: Dr. Sarah Thomas and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen and his Swiss supervisor is Prof. Sabine Hahn (Berner Fachhochschule/ Bern University of Applied Sciences).

 

Reference:

  1. Wolfensberger P. Thomas, S., Sheppard, Z., Hahn, S, van Teijlingen, E.  ‘Uncertainty in illness among people living with mental ill health – a mental health nursing perspective’  British Journal of Mental Health Nursing (Accepted)

 

 

 

 

Funding Call: Knowledge Frontiers – International Interdisciplinary Research

Funding opportunities, international

The British Academy has opened Funding Call: Knowledge Frontiers – International Interdisciplinary Research 2020, funded by the UK’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. The deadline for submissions and UK institutional approval is 23 October 2019 at 17.00 (UK time), awards up to £200,000 for duration of 24 months, projects must begin on 1 April 2020.

The British Academy is inviting proposals from UK-based researchers in the humanities and social sciences wishing to develop international interdisciplinary projects in collaboration with colleagues from the natural, engineering and/or medical sciences. The Academy is looking to fund applications that break new ground in the collaborations – international and interdisciplinary. The purpose of each project will be to develop new international research ideas.

The Academy encourages partnerships with researchers in low-income countries, however applications focused on any country are welcome.

Applications must demonstrate an innovative and interdisciplinary approach yielding new conceptual understandings, developing ground-breaking research and energising innovative collaborations between the humanities and social sciences on the one hand, and the natural, engineering and/or medical sciences on the other, related to one or more of the following themes:

  • Hazard and Risk
  • Cultures of Forecasting
  • Meaning of Resilience

RDS is currently working with cross-disciplinary group of BU academics to develop a proposal. If you are interested either to join the existing group or willing to lead/create a new group, please contact Research Facilitator Ainar Blaudums for further details by the middle of August.