11 February 2016

CMMPH editorial on Sustainable Development Goals in Nepal

international, open access, Publishing, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

Congratulations to FHSS post-doctoral researcher Dr. Pramod Regmi who is the lead author on the forthcoming editorial ‘Sustainable Development Goals: relevance to maternal and child health in Nepal’.[1] The Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) has extensive research experience in the field of maternal and child health in Nepal. This latest editorial was invited by the editors of Health Prospect. The scientific journal Health Prospect is published by the Nepal Public Health Students’ Society.

The editorial outlines the recent history of the Millennium Development Goals which came to an end in 2015 [2] and which are now replaced by the Sustainable Development Goals [3]. The authors argue that continued technical and financial support from external development partners is necessary to sustain Nepal’s achievements in maternal and child health and to strengthen its health-service provision. They also suggest that the Sustainable Development Goals offer an opportunity to change Nepal for the better.

This is a joint publication with BU Visiting Faculty Prof. Padam Simkhada (Liverpool John Moores University) and two of CMMPH PhD students who research aspects of maternity care in Nepal, namely Sheetal Sharma and Preeti Mahato.

Professors Vanora Hundley & Edwin van Teijlingen

References:

Regmi, PR, van Teijlingen, E, Hundley, V, Simkahda, P., Sharma, S, Mahato, P. (2016) Sustainable Development Goals: relevance to maternal and child health in Nepal, Health Prospect (accepted for publication).
van Teijlingen, E., Hundley, V., Matthews, Z., Lewis, G., Graham, W.J., Campbell, J., ten Hoope-Bender, P., Sheppard, Z.A., Hulton, L. (2014) Millennium Development Goals: All good things must come to an end, so what next? Midwifery 30: 1-2.
World Health Organization (2015). Health in 2015: from MDGs, Millennium Development Goals to SDGs, Sustainable Development Goals. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization. Available: http://www.who.int/gho/publications/mdgs-sdgs/en/

4 February 2016

China – your partner for research?

Funding opportunities, international Emily Cieciura

With the Global BUzz China event taking place on 10th February 2016, here is a quick round-up of research opportunities and sources of information regarding collaborative working with Chinese partners.

The first port of call for BU staff to locate current funding opportunities is via our subscription to Research Professional. A search has been set up in the Bournemouth University groups. To access these, just log in and click on ‘Bournemouth University’ on the top right of your screen. You will then be able to select ‘Country – China’ from the list and use the search which has been set up to locate current and future calls. If you are not sure how to use Research Professional, please refer to the recent blog post.

From these opportunities, the following are highlighted for you to consider:

Newton Fund – do you have a contact in China who would benefit from a Newton International Fellowship?
Do you need support to travel to China to conduct research? Then the British Academy Sino-British Fellowship Trust may suit your needs.
Through the China–UK research and innovation bridges competition, Innovate UK, RCUK and MoST have up to £16 million to invest in collaborative research & development projects that propose new commercial solutions to challenges impacting the socio-economic growth & development of China in relation to energy, healthcare, urbanisation and agri-food.

Other useful sources of information include:

MoST – Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China
RCUK – China
The Great Britain China Centre
EU Relations with China
UK and China
British Council – China

Keep an eye on this blog for futher international funding opportunities!

4 February 2016

Newton Fund News

Funding opportunities, Info Days, international Emily Cieciura

The Newton Fund aims to promote the economic development and welfare of either the 15 partner countries or, through working with the partner country, to address the problems of poor people around the world. It will do so through strengthening their science and innovation capacity and unlocking further funding to support poverty alleviation. It is part of the UK’s official development assistance (ODA).

The fund is managed by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.

The Fund consists of £75 million each year from 2014 for 5 years and covers three broad areas:

People: increasing capacity in science and innovation, individually and institutionally in partner countries
Research: research collaborations on development topics
Translation: creating collaborative solutions to development challenges and strengthening innovation systems

Find out more about the Newton Fund – how it works, funding opportutnies and its partners.

You can get involved with the Newton Fund. Hosted by the UK HE International Unit, the 2nd Newton Fund Network meeting is taking place on 3rd March 2016.

Confirmed speakers include:

Claire Durkin, Head of International Knowledge and Innovation (Global), Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS)
Dr Claire McNulty, Director of Science, British Council
Jacqui Williams, Newton Fund Strategic Lead, RCUK
Daniel Gosling, Newton Fund Programme Officer, Innovate UK

You may also consider attending one of the British Council International Researcher Workshops. Early Career Researchers can apply for funding to attend.

To keep up to date with all the latest Newton Fund news, direct to your inbox, why not subcribe to their newsletter.

3 February 2016

Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship Workshop – 16th and 17th March 2016

Funding opportunities, international Emily Cieciura

Are you applying to the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships scheme in September 2016?

Although the call does not formally open until 14/4/16, now is the time to start working with your potential fellow to ensure that your application is ready in good time. This is a popular scheme for applications from BU and, as it has a deadline of 14/9/16, this puts pressure on your fellow academics undertaking quality reviews at an already busy time. You may also wish to avoid writing your application in August when you are preparing for the new academic year.

To this end, RKEO are providing two-day workshops with Dr Martin Pickard (our external bidding consultant) on 16th and 17th March 2016 for BU academics and we have now confirmed additional workshop dates on the 24th and 25th of May 2016 – however we will be gauging demand for this. These workshop will take you through all aspects of exploring the call requirements and writing your bid, plus the opportunity to discuss your developing application with academics on the same journey.

You are encouraged to attend with your potential fellow but they will need to make their own travel arrangements and cover any financial outlay.

Booking are now open for these two-day workshop. Please note that you will need to attend both days. Please send your request to attend to Dianne Goodman, RKEO Funding Development Team Co-ordinator by asap. Please let us know if you will be bringing your potential fellow.

In the meantime, to find out more about this call, please refer to the funding opportunity page on the Horizon 2020 Participant Portal and the Work Programme for Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions, which gives vital information on the Horizon 2020 context for this call. If you have any questions before the workshop, please contact Emily Cieciura, RKEO Research Facilitator: EU & International.

2 February 2016

The Graduate School in the Netherlands

conferences, international, PG research ccutler

Professor Tiantian Zhang attended the 9^th EUA Council for Doctoral Education (CDE) in the Netherlands on the 20^th – 21^st January, 2016. The EUA CDE is dedicated to improving and developing doctoral education. This event was attended by approximately 110 international delegates who represented numerous Universities from across Europe. Representing the Graduate School from Bournemouth University, Professor Zhang was able to network and develop international contacts with other Universities. This was a wonderful opportunity for a representative from BU to learn and exchange good practices with others who are dedicated to enhancing the Doctoral Education experience.

28 January 2016

Editorial by Dr. Way in top journal highlights midwifery education

Fusion, international, Publishing Edwin van Teijlingen

The forthcoming editorial in Midwifery (Elsevier) by FHSS’s Dr Susan Way highlights the importance of midwifery education and its educators.[1] This editorial makes reference to the recent series on midwifery in The Lancet.[2] Of course, midwifery plays a vital role in improving the quality of care of women and infants globally. Dr. Way reminds us that consistent, high-quality midwifery care has a vital role to play in the reduction of maternal and newborn mortality. Outcomes are enhanced when care is led by midwives who are educated, licensed, regulated, integrated in the health system, and working in interdisciplinary teams, with ready access to specialised care when needed.

Midwifery one of the leading academic journals globally in the field of midwifery and maternity care. Dr.Way is based in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health in FHSS at the Lansdowne Campus.

Congratulations!

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References:

Way, S. (2015) Consistent, quality midwifery care: How midwifery education and the role of the midwife teacher are important contributions to the Lancet Series, Midwifery (online first) see: http://www.midwiferyjournal.com/article/S0266-6138(16)00021-8/abstract
Renfrew, M.J., McFadden, A., Bastos, M.H. et al. (2014) Midwifery and quality care: findings from a new evidence-informed framework for maternal and newborn care. the Lancet. 384:1129–1145.

25 January 2016

Presentation by PhD student Preeti Mahato Jan 27th.

international, PG research, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

On Wednesday Jan. 27th CMMPH PhD student Preeti Mahato will present her PhD research ideas under the title “Addressing quality of care and equity of services available at birthing centres to improve maternal and neonatal health in western Nepal.” Her presentation will be held at the Lansdowne Campus at 13.00 in room 301 in Royal London House.

Preeti’s research focuses on birthing centres in western Nepal; and quality and equity of service available at these facilities. In Nepal, birthing centres act as first contact point for the women seeking maternity services especially the basic obstetric care. The focus of this presentation will be to talk about the first review article Preeti Mahato wrote for the ‘Journal of Asian Midwives’ entitled “Birthing centres in Nepal: Recent development, obstacles and opportunities”. The article has been accepted for publication in June 2016 and focuses on introducing birthing centres, their current state of operation under the health system of Nepal, barriers they are facing and what could be done to improve their present state. The quality of care issue available at birthing centre is emphasised, since the number of these facilities are increasing however there is a growing trend to bypass and uptake services at hospitals. Despite barriers to utilisation of services at birthing centres, they can play an important role in increasing institutional delivery rate and proportion of births benefiting from a skilled birth attendant.

The second part of presentation will provide a brief summary on what Preeti has done since writing a review article, as she has worked on a systematic review on quality of basic obstetric care facilities in low and middle income countries.

Preeti Mahato has worked in the field of public health in Nepal for three years after completing her Master of Public Health. She has an interest in sexual and reproductive health, women’s health and maternal and child health. Working as a public health officer she was involved in maternal and neonatal health that developed her interest in pursuing a doctorate related to maternal and neonatal health. Part of her work in Nepal also included monitoring and supervision of birthing centres in rural areas of Nepal and that is how she became motivated to start a PhD at BU.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

24 January 2016

Sociology presentation at Dutch Annual Midwifery Conference (22 Jan. 2016)

international, Knowledge Transfer, Public engagement, Publishing Edwin van Teijlingen

On Friday January 22nd 2016 FHSS Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen delivered a keynote address at the Annual Research Conference of the Dutch Midwifery Schools. The Dutch name for the event is ‘conferentie kennispoort’, in English ‘conference knowledge portal’ OR in a slightly different translation ‘conference knowledge gate’. The presentation aimed to get midwives, maternity care researchers and midwifery students and others in the audience to think differently about the world in which they work / practise. Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen used notions of a social versus a medical model in his talk. These are based on a number of sociology and midwifery publications of this concept over the past decade.[1-4]

Sociologists recognise two different approaches or philosophies as first a social model and, secondly, a medical model of childbirth. The social model stresses that childbirth is a physiological event that takes place in most women’s lives. The medical model highlights that childbirth is potentially pathological (or risky). In the latter view every pregnant woman is potentially at risk, hence she should deliver her baby in an obstetric hospital with its high-technology screening equipment supervised by obstetricians, the experts when something goes seriously wrong in childbirth. In other words, pregnancy and childbirth are only safe in retrospect.

References:

Bryers, HM, van Teijlingen E (2010) Risk, Theory, Social & Medical Models: a critical analysis of the concept of risk in maternity care, Midwifery 26: 488-96.
Ireland, J., van Teijlingen, E. (2013) Normal birth: social-medical model, The Practising Midwife 16 (11): 17-20.
van Teijlingen E (2005) Models of pregnancy and childbirth: A sociological analysis of the medical model, Sociol Res Online 10 (2) www.socresonline.org.uk/10/2/teijlingen.html
van Teijlingen E (2015) Sociology of Midwifery. In: Sociology for Midwives Deery R, et al. (eds.) Cambridge: Polity Press, 22-37.

19 January 2016

New CMMPH international midwifery publication

international, Publishing, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Congratulations to Professor Vanora Hundley in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) on the publication of her latest international paper ‘How do midwives in Slovenia view their professional status?’ [1].

The paper explores Slovenian midwives’ views of their professional status, linkng this to the participants’ educational background. Most participants did not consider midwifery to be a profession in its ow right. Midwives with secondary education were more likely to consider practical skills to be important than theoretical midwifery knowledge. In general Slovenian midwives did not feel enabled to practise autonomously causing them several ethical dilemmas. All participants with midwifery secondary school education thought that obstetrics jeopardises midwifery scope of practice, but only half of the B.Sc. participants thought this. One-fifth of all participants estimated that midwifery is also threatened by nursing. The respondents reported feeling a lack of control over their professional activity and policy making; however the majority of midwives claimed that they were willing to take on more responsibility for independent practice. The authors conclude that Slovenian midwifery cannot be considered to be a profession yet. It faces several hindrances, due to its historical development.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

Reference:

Mivšek, P., Pahor, M., Hlebec, V., Hundley, V. (2015) How do midwives in Slovenia view their professional status? Midwifery 31(12):1193-201

18 January 2016

Shakespeare festival: open call for digital ideas

international jcodling

What is it about?

BBC Arts Online and the British Council, supported by the GREAT Britain campaign, are collaborating to enable audiences, in the UK and overseas, to experience and discover the best of British Shakespeare in all art forms. The plan is to open with a 24 hour live-stream on 23 April 2016 and to offer new content on a regular basis over six months.

The British Council, on behalf of the GREAT Britain campaign, is calling for ideas from artists and cultural organisations across the UK. Funding is available for international rights clearances and to support the production of new content.

Five key cultural organisations are already working with to provide world-class content – Shakespeare’s Globe, The Royal Opera House, the British Film Institute, Hay Festivals and the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Shakespeare400 consortium coordinated by King’s College.

The content will be hosted on BBC Shakespeare Lives (bbc.co.uk/shakespearelives ) and promoted internationally by BBC Worldwide online ( bbc.com/culture) so global rights need to be cleared . The campaign will be supported by social media campaigns in order to drive audiences to this unique festival.

This is an unprecedented partnership project for the BBC and the British Council and believe it has great potential for all organisations involved to increase their international reach and reputation.

How can I get involved?

We are particularly looking for ideas which appeal to younger audiences and convey the diversity and creativity of the UK’s Arts sector. If you are interested in applying, please complete the attached form.

APPLICATIONS CLOSE TUESDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2016

Click here for more information including the application form.

14 January 2016

Dr Debbie Sadd – Visit to Tokyo

international, Knowledge Transfer Debbie Sadd

I have recently returned from my visit to Tokyo to attend a symposium on behalf of the British Council. The Symposium was entitled “What are the roles and opportunities for universities before, during and after an international sporting event? Sharing experiences from the London Olympics and Paralympics to forge a deeper UK-Japan collaboration” The symposium was attended by over 100 Japanese academics as well an members of the Tokyo 2020 organising committee (TOCOG).

I made a presentaion on behalf of Bournemouth University’s involvement in London 2012 (including Weymouth and Portland) and then sat on a panel of experts to answer specific questions around different aspects of academic engagement. These included how to involve students and staff, as well as local communities, in the opportunities to be leveraged. There was considerable interest in how a university outside of London became so involved in London 2012!

On the way there my journey took an unexpected twist in that I had to fly via Shanghai (thank you BA) and so with such a short time in Tokyo, it meant more flying time than actually there on the ground! However, it did allow a bit of free time as can be seen by the photos below:

After the Symposium there was a reception and dinner with the traditional exchange of business cards, meishi, which is an essential part of Japanese etiquette. Thankfully I had arranaged to have my cards translated into Japanese which helped enormously and has resulted in being able to network with some prestigious universities and professors for future collaboration.

14 January 2016

Mental health & maternity care in Nepal: THET-funded training

international, open access Edwin van Teijlingen

A few days I posted a short report of our first session as part of the THET-funded project ‘Mental Health Training for Community-based Maternity Providers in Nepal’, see this previous post here. Yesterday we completed the final third day training of the first session of this BU-led project. Over three days we had 70 ANMs (Auxiliary Nurse Midwives) in attendance, which we think is (nearly) all such staff based in all birthing centres in the district (=province). The three days were the same, i.e. each session was repeated twice so each day one third of the ANMs could attend, and two-third could be at work in the birthing centre ensuring women could deliver safely.

As part of this project we send UK volunteers (health and/or education) experts to Nepal to offer high quality training in areas where it is most needed. Further detail on this BU-led THET project can be found in our scientific paper Mental health issues in pregnant women in Nepal published in the Nepal Journal of Epidemiology available through Open Access. Mental illness is still very much a taboo topic in Nepal as it has often a serious stigma attached to it. Moreover, the relatively short training of ANMs is often fairly basic and the national curriculum does not cover mental health issues in any detail. This joint project between Bournemouth University, Liverpool John Mooores University, Tribhuvan University and the local charity Green Tata Nepal addresses issues about mental health in general and in pregnant women and new mothers in particular. Tribhuvan University is the oldest university in Nepal and one of the ten largest universities in the world (based on student numbers). The project is multi-disciplinary involving midwives, (mental health) nurses, and doctors as well as global health researchers, educationalists and sociologists.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

8 January 2016

Dr Debbie Sadd visit to Tokyo

international, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer Debbie Sadd

I have recently returned from my visit to Tokyo to attend a symposium on behalf of the British Council. The Symposium was entitled “What are the roles and opportunities for universities before, during and after an international sporting event? Sharing experiences from the London Olympics and Paralympics to forge a deeper UK-Japan collaboration” The symposium was attended by over 100 Japanese academics as well an members of the Tokyo 2020 organising committee (TOCOG).

I made a presentaion on behalf of Bournemouth University’s involvement in London 2012 (including Weymouth and Portland) and then sat on a panel of experts to answer specific questions around different aspects of academic engagement. These included how to involve students and staff, as well as local communities, in the opportunities to be leveraged. There was considerable interest in how a university outside of London became so involved in London 2012!

On the way there my journey took an unexpected twist in that I had to fly via Shanghai (thank you BA) and so with such a short time in Tokyo, it meant more flying time than actually there on the ground! However, it did allow a bit of free time as can be seen by the photos below:

After the Symposium there was a reception and dinner with the traditional exchange of business cards, meishi, which is an essential part of Japanese etiquette. Thankfully I had arranaged to have my cards translated into Japanese which helped enormously and has resulted in being able to network with some prestigious universities and professors for future collaboration.

2 January 2016

Field visit to birthing centre in rural Nepal

international, PG research, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Today, as part of several related maternity-care studies, one of Bournemouth University’s (BU) researchers visited a rural birthing centre in Nawalparasi. The first photo is the view from the birthing centre showing exactly how rural it is. This particular birthing centre is based close to the Indian border. It has been supported for over a year by Green Tara Nepal, an organisation which works closely with BU on a range of health and maternity-care projects. The birthing centre has been improved since our last visit one year ago. There now is a newly build decomposition pit for the disposal of placentas. There is a new postnatal recovery room, and the number of local women giving birth in the facility has been increasing! When we arrived a new baby had just been born an hour or so earlier (second photo with proud father on the right).

This and several neighbouring birthing centres are the focus of a PhD study by FHSS’s Preeti Mahato. She recently co-authored an editorial in Nepal Journal of Epidemiology on the role of birthing centres in post-earthquake Nepal [1]. Her PhD is supervised by Dr. Catherine Angell, Prof. Padam Simkhada, based at Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) and who is also Visiting Faculty at BU, and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen.

The birthing centre also lies in the area where the charity Green Tara Nepal has been supporting groups for pregnant women and their mothers-in-law. The latter is an important group as they are still key decision-makers on maternity care questions related to their daughters-in-law [2]. The birthing centre is part of a wider intervention to improve the uptake of antenatal and postnatal care and skilled attendance at delivery. BU has been involved in evaluating this intervention with Green Tara Trust (UK) and LJMU for nearly a decade.

Some of the birthing centre staff will attend the mental health and maternity care training organised next week [3]. This training project is run by a consortium of BU, LJMU, and Tribhuvan University (the oldest university in Nepal). This mental health and maternity care project is supported by the Tropical Health & Education Trust (THET) as part of the Health Partnership Scheme, which is funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID), and in the field our THET project is supported by Green Tara Nepal.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References:

Mahato, P.K., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C., Sathian, B. (2015) Birthing centre infrastructure in Nepal post 2015 earthquake. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(4): 518-519. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/14260/11579
Simkhada, B., Porter, M., van Teijlingen, E. (2010) The role of mothers-in-law in antenatal care decision-making in Nepal: A qualitative study. BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 10(34) biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2393-10-34.pdf
van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Devkota, B., Fanning, P., Ireland, J., Simkhada, B., Sherchan, L., Silwal, R.C., Pradhan, S., Maharjan, S.K., Maharjan, R.K. (2015) Mental health issues in pregnant women in Nepal. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(3): 499-501. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/13607/11007

1 January 2016

First CMMPH editorials of 2016

international, open access, PG research, Publishing, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

Happy New Year and a healthy and successful 2016. I have the pleasure to announce the first two editorials published this year by CMMPH staff and students. Although I am slightly cheating as the editorials were really published yesterday on the very last day of 2015 in the latest edition of the Nepal Journal of Epidemiology. In my defence I didn’t have access to the internet here in Nepal until this afternoon.

The first of the two editorials focuses on small-scale community birth centres in post-earthquake Nepal [1]. The lead author of this editorial our CMMPH PhD student Preeti Mahata and all her co-authors are affiliated with BU. Dr. Pramod Regmi, Dr. Catherine Angell and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen are FHSS staff and Prof. Padam Simkhada and Dr. Brijesh Sathian are both BU Visiting Faculty. Preeti Mahato is conducting her PhD research on birthing centres in Nawalparasi, in the south of Nepal, in an area bordering India.

The second editorial looks at ‘health’ in the recently announced new Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nepal [2]. The concept of health as a human right seems to us quite central in the Nepalese Constitution, considerably more so than in the Constitutions of the USA or the Netherlands, for example. Four of the five authors of this editorial are affiliated with BU, whilst Dr.Puspa Pant is based at the Centre for Child and Adolescent Health, at the University of the West of England.

The Nepal Journal of Epidemiology is Gold Open Access hence both editorials are freely available to everyone.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

References:

Mahato, P.K., Regmi, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Angell, C., Sathian, B. (2015) Birthing centre infrastructure in Nepal post 2015 earthquake. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(4): 518-519. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/14260/11579
Simkhada, P., Regmi, P.R., Pant, P.R., van Teijlingen, E., Sathian, B. (2015) Stipulating citizens’ fundamental right to healthcare: Inference from the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nepal 2015. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(4); 516-517. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/14257/11576

31 December 2015

THET-funded project in Nepal

international, open access, writing Edwin van Teijlingen

Yesterday Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen met with Nepalese collaborators from Tribhuvan University to discuss the first training session planned for THET project ‘Mental Health Training for Maternity Care Providers in Nepal‘. The target population of the project comprises community-based health-care practitioners at the level of nurse and below (there are no doctors in rural villages). The project is a collaboration between the Department of Health, Physical and Population Education at Nepal’s oldest and largest university, Tribhuvan University’s (TU), and two UK universities, Bournemouth University (BU) and Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU), and supported by our local partner, Green Tara Nepal (GTN). BU has a long history of working with GTN as well as its sister organisation Green Tara Trust (GTT), a Buddhist charity based in London. The project is funded from a grant awarded under the Health Partnership Scheme (HPS). HPS put money into health partnerships to carry out training and capacity-building projects in low-income countries, such as Nepal. HPS itself is funded by the UK Department for International Development (DfID) and managed by THET (Tropical Health & Education Trust).

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen is one of the first volunteers together with BU Visiting Faculty Dr. Bibha Simkhada (research nurse at LJMU & practising nurse in the NHS). Together with collaborators in Nepel they will deliver the first training early in 2016 (i.e. next week) on this THET project. The first photo shows Prof. Lokendra Sherchan writing a letter of invitation to the District Public Health Officer in Nawalparasi inviting him to encourage his staff to participate in our training. The letter is beautifully handwritten in Nepali as the university is closed between terms at the moment. The second photo shows professors Shyam K Maharjan, Ram K Maharjan and Edwin van Teijlingen in discussion with Kathmandu in the background. Both photos are taken by GTN’s Samridhi Pradhan. We have published some of the background information on our project earlier this year in the Nepal Journal of Epidemiology [1].

References:

van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Devkota, B., Fanning, P., Ireland, J., Simkhada, B., Sherchan, L., Silwal, R.C., Pradhan, S., Maharjan, S.K., Maharjan, R.K. (2015) Mental health issues in pregnant women in Nepal. Nepal Journal of Epidemiology 5(3): 499-501. http://www.nepjol.info/index.php/NJE/article/view/13607/11007

17 December 2015

Impacting on policy and process: BU Corporate Social Responsibility expert informs discussions at German Football Association’s annual congress

Fusion, international, Publishing tbreitbarth

Management academic Dr Tim Breitbarth (Department of Sport & Physical Activity) was invited by the German Football Association (DFB) to provide input and add to the discussions at DFB’s 1^st Annual Congress on Social Responsibility. With over six million members, DFB is the largest single sports federation in the world.

Held in Hennef on November 26^th-27^th, the event brought together 70 of the DFB’s executives and leadership team from across the country, including vice-presidents, directors and representatives from all regions and states. Tim contributed as an external expert panelist for the moderated ‘fireside discussion’ that kicked-off the ambitious program and provided guidance at the start of the workshop on communication and marketing value of corporate social responsibility in the context of the sports association.

The DFB seeks to take a proactive stance on reflecting upon and invigorating its socio-political role and policies, especially by encouraging its regional and local entities and more than 25,000 individual clubs to embrace the process.

Recently, Tim provided Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) communication expertise to DFB’s Social Responsibility Commission (see this blog post) and moderated a similar event for Sport Federation Lower-Saxony, which is the umbrella organization for almost 10,000 sports clubs and 3 individual million members.

His engagement and expertise is underpinned by his research, e.g. manifested in a recent special issue of Corporate Governance on “Governance and CSR management in sport” and an upcoming special issue of Journal of Public Affairs on “The marketing and public affairs of sustainability”.

16 December 2015

Creative Europe -measuring the creative industries of Europe

international jcodling

The origins of the EU – a coal and steel free trade agreement – lie elsewhere; however Europe’s creative industries are likely to be an increasingly important part of its economic future. Creative industries provide jobs that are highly skilled and more resistant to automation, jobs that are therefore more likely to be sustainable. [1] Understanding them is therefore of strategic importance.

A challenge in thinking about creative industries at a European level has been the absence of comparable statistics across the countries of the EU. Nesta’s report by Max Nathan, Andy Pratt and Ana Rincon-Aznar, published today, helps address this by providing consistent estimates of employment in the creative industries of the EU’s 28 member states and, where data has allowed, the wider ‘creative economies’ of 20 member states (the ‘creative economy’ consists of jobs inside the creative industries and creative jobs in other industries, for example a designer working for a car manufacturer).

For more information on this report click here.

If this is the type of information you would find interesting why not sign up to receive updates into your inbox from Nesta

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Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship Workshop – 16th and 17th March 2016

Are you applying to the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships scheme in September 2016?

The Graduate School in the Netherlands

Editorial by Dr. Way in top journal highlights midwifery education

Presentation by PhD student Preeti Mahato Jan 27th.

New CMMPH international midwifery publication

Shakespeare festival: open call for digital ideas

What is it about?

How can I get involved?

APPLICATIONS CLOSE TUESDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2016

Dr Debbie Sadd – Visit to Tokyo

Dr Debbie Sadd visit to Tokyo

Field visit to birthing centre in rural Nepal

THET-funded project in Nepal

Impacting on policy and process: BU Corporate Social Responsibility expert informs discussions at German Football Association’s annual congress

Creative Europe -measuring the creative industries of Europe

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Are you applying to the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships scheme in September 2016?

What is it about?

How can I get involved?

APPLICATIONS CLOSE TUESDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2016

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