Latest research and knowledge exchange news at Bournemouth University
Flourishing with Fusion is the theme for this year’s research showcase for Mid-Career Academics.
This event will explore how fusion works in practice, and how engaging with research at BU can enhance your career. It will showcase the exciting work of a number of BU academics, and there will be a panel for Q & A.
POSTPONED from Wednesday 4th September – a new date will be announced shortly. Contact RKEDF for more information.
This past week Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen from the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) presented several workshops on academic writing and scientific publishing to BU’s partners in Nepal. He presented at Nepal’s oldest and largest university Tribhuvan University (TU) on Wednesday. The Faculty of Education had made the effort to produce a personalised banner for Edwin. Prof. Bhimsen Devkota, who invited him to run this workshop, was his PhD student many years ago at the University of Aberdeen
The next day he visited Manmohan Memorial Institute of Health Sciences (MMIH
S) which has a Memorandum of Agreement with BU, which was signed by Prof. Tee in early 2018 (see BU Research Blog). At MMIHS the audience that day consisted mostly of Master of Public Health students. Edwin recently celebrated his ten-years of being Visiting Professor at MMIHS.
Yesterday he had the honour of running a workshop at BNMT (Birat Nepal Medical Trust), affiliated with the Britain Nepal Medical Trust which started working in Nepal more than fifty years ago in 1967. The audience at BNMT was smaller and this allowed for loads of fruitful discussions.
These workshops are part of BU capacity building approach for health workers, development workers, health students and researchers in Nepal. Writing with colleagues in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences, and various UK universities, including with Visiting Faculty based at Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) and University of Exeter Medical School (UEMS) as well as Visiting Faculty at NHS Poole Foundation Hospital and Hamad General Hospital (Qatar) the BU team as published 12 papers on aspects of academic writing and/or publishing [1-12].
References
Hardly ever does a research trip go smoothly and completely to plan. Our latest trip to Nepal was no different. It started really with a delay, I had the money for a flight in the spring, but I really could not find the time to leave Bournemouth University for a three-week trip.
The first little hiccup of this summer’s fieldwork trip, during the monsoon, occurred on arrival at Kathmandu Airport on 23 July. I normally bring three bottles of whisky as a present for my PhD former students and fellow researchers in Nepal. These are bought during my stop-over in the Middle East and this always worked well until this year. This time I was stopped on arrival by a very apologetic customs officer who informed me that the rules for bringing alcohol into Nepal had changed since the beginning of this year and that I could only bring in one bottle. I received a lovely certificate for the two bottles I had to leave behind (see photo).
The second little hiccup was that one of the three research dissemination meetings we had hoped to organise in Kathmandu could not take place. Unfortunately, the organisation we had been collaborating with had not managed to finalise the research report on time. We had also hoped to meet up with staff at Social Science Baha. We have submitted the final draft manuscript for our next book to them and wanted to discuss progress, but the director was unfortunately out of the country.
Further little hiccups were more mundane, such as the electricity going off twice (for perhaps five minutes each time) during one of my teaching sessions on Introduction to Qualitative Research. This meant trying to start a slow laptop as back-up, whilst restarting a still warm overhead projector, etc. But the Nepali audience, being used this, took it all in its stride. And I’ll spare you the details of my day of diarrhoea (either weather or food-hygiene related, probably both).
The biggest problem this time was much more unexpected. Two days ago there was a big fire not too far from in Kathmandu (see picture taken from my bed room). A little later after the photo was taken, we got stuck in traffic because several roads were blocked around the burning building on our way to Tribhuvan University. Later I found out that the fire had destroyed the head office of a national internet provider, which is also the provider for the charity Green Tara Nepal, which we are working with. So I have had hardly any internet for a few days which is really difficult for a 21st century academic.
However, this fieldwork trip has been very successful to date. We have co-organised two well attended meetings, one on the introduction of CPD in Nursing led by Dr. Bibha Simkhada (see previous BU blog here) and one Consultation meeting on migration and health research led by Dr. Pramod Regmi, both run in collaboration with BU’s Visiting Professor Padam Simkhada. Moreover, I was invited to speak at an international sociology conference last Sunday here in Kathmandu which I did not even know was going on till two days before. I had to pleasure of meeting our midwifery friends in Nepal as well as a representative of the German Aid Agency GIZ. We managed to have dinner in Kathmandu with loads of colleagues and friends who work with BU in one form or another, including one of my recent co-authors from the University of Tokyo who happened to be in Nepal.
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
On the 4th of April 1944, just two months before D-Day, a large-scale, live-fire amphibious landing exercise “Exercise Smash I” took place in Studland Bay. Unfortunately, the sea conditions on the day resulted in the sinking of six of the DD (Duplex-Drive) Valentine amphibious tanks used, also resulting in the loss of six lives. In 2014 BU Maritime Archaeology conducted a search for the tank wrecks, as the location of some of them had been lost, and carried out a survey of archaeological remains. In 2018 they returned to the wrecks and created 3D photogrammetric scans of the tanks.
“Exercise Smash” Virtual Heritage Experience
Following a brief developed by Dr Eike Falk Anderson of the National Centre for Computer Animation (NCCA) in cooperation with Tom Cousins of BU Maritime Archaeology, and on the basis of the 3D scans of the sunk tanks, a group of undergraduate students of the NCCA created the “Exercise Smash” virtual heritage experience, leveraging modern video games infrastructure (in this case the Unreal Engine 4). Blending a historical serious game with a virtual dive trail, in a snapshot in time, users live the past and try to land an amphibious tank while taking part in “Exercise Smash”, and then return to the present to explore the tank wrecks in Studland Bay during a virtual dive. The project was conducted as part of the 2nd year Group Project unit (led by Susan Sloan) by students from three of the NCCA’s undergraduate programmes, BA (Hons) Computer Animation Art and Design (Arran Bidwell, Alexander Lechev and Manuella Nagiel), BA (Hons) Computer Animation Technical Arts (Joseph Adams and Dawid Kupisinski) and BSc (Hons) Software Development for Animation, Games and Effects (Radu Rosca).
“Exercise Smash” at Tankfest 2019
At the end of June, the “Exercise Smash” virtual heritage experience was presented to the public for all three days of Tankfest 2019 at The Tank Museum in Bovington (this year enjoyed by a record of around 24000 visitors according to the Dorset Echo) at the BU Maritime Archaeology stand. There, the project was very well received by the museum as well as by the visitors of Tankfest. Visiting children especially loved the virtual heritage experience and “had to be peeled away from driving the tank by their parents”.
Yesterday Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen from CMMPH (Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health) gave a presentation on ‘Social and Medical Model of Childbirth’ at the International Conference 2019 with the specific title ‘Sociology of Nepal: State Restructuring, Good Governance & People’s Participation’. This international conference was organised by NSA (Nepal Sociological Association) in Kathmandu.
Prof. van Teijlingen outlined the notion of the social-medical model [1-5] and linked it to recent developments in Nepal, including the introduction of midwifery education (i.e. midwifery separately from nursing) something tat has been advocated for a long time [6] and the rising Caesarean Section rate in Nepal, especially in hospitals in the capital [7].
References:
Denyse King from the Centre of Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal (CMMPH) recently presented her CILVRS Project at a Parliamentary event. The CILVRS Project is a Virtual Reality Learning Environment (VRLE) to improve healthcare education. Denyse presented this at the Further Education for Leadership symposium on Ed-Tech at Parliament on July 17th 2019. She introduced a VRLE on ‘safeguarding’ to share with delegates there who then experienced the VRLE through immersion with Oculus Quest headsets. 
The response from symposium delegates to the VRLE was overwhelmingly positive and with excellent discussions regarding the possible content of future VRLEs. Denyse has written this VRLE content as part of her role as a lecturer in midwifery. This was subsequently built to her specifications by a company called Daden Ltd. The VRLE are designed to be profession generic and topic specific, which ensures that the majority of healthcare students can use each VRLE. Denyse King is sitting on the far right of the table of experts for the Further Education Trust for Leadership (photo). 
VRLEs offer healthcare students access learning materials in ways which enhance their student experience. Use of VRLE mean Bournemouth University can offer students clinical experiences which cannot otherwise be guaranteed as routine part of their healthcare education. In addition to this, Continuous Practice Development (CPD) is a requirement of the Nursing and Midwifery Council [1-2] and the World Health Organization (WHO) [3] have highlighted that learners globally have limited access to Higher Education. The WHO also state that educators internationally lack skills and necessary equipment as well as a lack of access to practical skills teaching. Therefore, VRLE also have a place in offering realistic clinical experiences for CPD nationally and internationally. One example of the latter would be through Bournemouth University a close working relationships in Nepal: (1) where midwifery students can also benefit; or (2) in the development of CPD in nursing and midwifery in Nepal as recently presented on the BU Research Blog (click here).
The CILVRS Project is another excellent example of the BU FUSION with Research resulting in improvements in Education, which in turn are leading to better Practice.
The response from symposium delegates to the VRLE was overwhelmingly positive and with excellent discussions regarding the possible content of future VRLEs. Denyse is very active in this field. She has created a VRLE for urinalysis training as well as three VRLE related to safeguarding (which are nearly complete) as part of the CILVRS Project. She is developing further VRLEs I: two for perinatal mental health which I am creating in collaboration with University of Newcastle (Australia), Solent NHS Trust and Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust. Some of this is being trialled within the BU midwifery programme in the forth coming year 2019/2020, and this exciting work is part of her doctorate research: Towards more holistic clinical practice: exploring the impact of virtual reality learning environments on healthcare education.
Congratulations!
Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen
CMMPH
References:
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.
The latest podcast from the National Institute for Health Research is available and this time concentrates on Research Ethics Committees.
All research with human participants should have appropriate ethical reflection – the podcast this month contains the thoughts and guidance of Dr Hugh Davies who is an established Research Ethics Committee Chair and former Ethics Advisor for the Health Research Authority.
If you are interested in learning more about NHS Research Ethics Committees you can view the dedicated section on the HRA website here, and even register your interest to sit as an observer at a committee meeting.
Happy listening!
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:
Congratulations to Orlanda Harvey, PhD student in the Faculty of Health & Social Sciences on her PhD publication “Support for people who use Anabolic Androgenic Steroids: A Systematic Scoping Review into what they want and what they access” in the Open Access journal BMC Public Health [1]. Since there is a paucity of research on support for people using Anabolic Androgenic Steroids (AAS), this article searched and synthesised the available evidence in this field. Gaining an understanding of the support both accessed and wanted by recreational AAS users will be of use to professionals who provide services to intravenous substance users and also to those working in the fields of public health and social care, with the aim to increase engagement of those using AAS.
This systematic scoping review identified 23 papers and one report for review, which indicated that AAS users access a range of sources of information on: how to inject, substance effectiveness, dosages and side effects, suggesting this is the type of information users want. AAS users sought support from a range of sources including medical professionals, needle and syringe programmes, friends, dealers, and via the internet, suggesting that, different sources were used dependent on the information or support sought.
The authors argue that AAS users tended to prefer peer advice and support over that of professionals , and access information online/specialist fora, reflecting the stigma that is experienced by AAS users. These tendencies can act as barriers to accessing services provided by professionals. The paper concludes that support needs to be specific and targeted towards AAS users. Sensitivity to their perceptions of their drug-use and the associated stigma of being classified in the same sub-set as other illicit drug users is relevant to facilitating successful engagement.
Reference:
Involving the public in your study is important, especially at the research design stage, this is known as ‘Public Involvement’ or ‘Patient & Public Involvement’ (PPI). This involvement can greatly improve the quality of your study design and documentation.
To better support researchers with this process (in particular for the purposes of clinical research), there is now a dedicated space for guidance, resources and wider reading, on the Clinical Governance blog space.
You can find the page here – as always if there are any specific queries, please get in touch with Research Ethics.
The next wave of major industrial and societal challenges to receive investment through the government’s modern Industrial Strategy have been confirmed.
The Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund brings together the UK’s world-leading research base with our best businesses to transform how we live, work and move around. It will put the UK in the best position to take advantage of future market opportunities.
The fund is delivered by UK Research and Innovation and is part of government’s £4.7 billion investment in R&D over 4 years that will support the delivery of its modern Industrial Strategy.
The details of the next wave of challenges are confirmed as below:
In addition last month the Government confirmed an investment in Quantum Technologies – a £153 million Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund which will be matched by industry with over £200 million of investment expected from the private sector.
Please see this link for more information.
This month’s fieldtrip to Nepal has a rather confusing element, namely the two separate organisations the BU team is working with have the same abbreviation. Not only that, each organisation/abbreviation is equally well known in its own field. Dr. Bibha Simkhada, Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen and FHSS’s Visiting Professor Padam Simkhada are here in Kathmandu to work with IOM (Institute of Medicine) Maharajgunj Nursing Campus. It is the pioneer school of nursing in the country and part of Nepal’s oldest university, Tribhuvan University. This collaboration involves studying issues around CPD (Continuous Professional Development) in Nursing in Nepal, and also includes BU’s Dr. Ian Donaldson and Dr. Catherine Angell.
The second research meeting next week or early August in Kathmandu is between BU’s Dr. Pramod Regmi, Prof. Padam Simkhada and Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen on the issue of health and migration with IOM (International Organisation of Migration). IOM, as a United Nations’ agency, is the leading international organization for migration. This health of migrants’ project also involves BU’s Dr. Nirmal Aryal and Dr. Preeti Mahato.
Sometimes it is all a little bit confusing. Perhaps as well that we don’t have a collaborator from the IOM (Isle of Man).
The photo of the week series is a weekly series featuring photos taken by our academics and students for our Research Photography Competition, which provides a snapshot of some of the incredible research undertaken across the BU community.
Below: Some eggcellent results obtained from the VMD developing latent fingermarks on a chicken egg using gold and zinc.
This week’s photo of the week, Fingermarks on a chicken egg developed by Vacuum Metal Deposition, is by Alex Otto and Nicola Jones, demonstrators in Forensic Science.
This past October Bournemouth University Forensic department welcomed its newest piece of latent fingermark development equipment to the Crime Scene Training Facility…the VMD 360! Following delivery, Demonstrators in Forensic Science Alex Otto, Nicola Jones and Christopher Dwen received bespoke training from West Technology Forensics over a two day period.
Vacuum Metal Deposition (VMD) is widely recognised as one of, if not the most powerful latent fingermark development techniques currently available. The technique is commonly used to develop latent fingermarks on porous, semi-porous and non-porous exhibits using metals such as gold, zinc and sterling silver. Latent fingermarks developed using VMD are frequently found to be superior quality, and with excellent ridge clarity and higher contrast than fingermarks developed using alternative forensic methods.
The VMD 360 is currently the only table-top vacuum metal deposition unit available in the world and is compact and aesthetically pleasing. Furthermore, with an abundance of potential forensic research still to be undertaken using VMD, such as development of fingermarks on eggs in cases involving rare wild bird egg theft, exciting times lay ahead!
Today saw the publication of a new paper from an international research team from the UK, Japan and Nepal. Our research article ‘Assessing knowledge and behavioural changes on maternal and newborn health among mothers following post-earthquake health promotion in Nepal’ has been published in the Open Access journal PLoS ONE [1].
The paper reminds us that natural disasters often disrupt health systems affecting the whole population, but especially vulnerable people such as pregnant women, new mothers and their babies. Despite the global progress in maternal, newborn and child health (MNCH) programmes over the years, emergency responses after a disaster are often poor. Post-disaster health promotion could play an important role in improving MNCH outcomes. However, evidence remains limited on the effect of post disaster health promotion activities in low-income countries such as Nepal.
The paper reports on an post-disaster intervention study aimed at women in Nepal following the 2015 earthquake. In total, 364 mothers were recruited in the pre-intervention group and 377 in the post-intervention group. The post-intervention group was more likely to have knowledge of at least three danger signs in pregnancy (AOR [Adjusted Odds Ratio] = 2.96, P<0.001), at least three danger signs in childbirth (AOR = 3.8, P<0.001), and at least five danger signs in newborns (AOR = 1.56, P<0.001) compared to the pre-intervention group. The mothers in the post-intervention group were also more likely to ever attend ANC (AOR = 7.18, P<0.001), attend a minimum of four ANC sessions (AOR = 5.09, P<0.001), and have institutional deliveries (AOR = 2.56, P<0.001).
Religious minority groups were less likely to have knowledge of all danger signs compared to the majority Hindu group. Mothers from poorer households were also less likely to attend four ANC sessions. Mothers with higher education were more likely to have knowledge of all the danger signs. Mothers whose husbands had achieved higher education were also more likely to have knowledge of danger signs and have institutional deliveries. The paper concludes that the health promotion intervention helped the disaster-affected mothers in improving the knowledge and behaviours related to MNCH. However, the authors also comment that vulnerable populations need more support to benefit from such intervention.
Reference:
Dhital R, Silwal RC, Simkhada P, van Teijlingen E, Jimba M (2019) Assessing knowledge and behavioural changes on maternal and newborn health among mothers following post-earthquake health promotion in Nepal. PLoS ONE 14(7): e0220191. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0220191
The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) run several fellowship schemes, a number of which are open to post-doctoral researchers. There are currently two fellowship roles with open applications.
These are 3-4 month placement fellowships, to experience working within a research and policy environment.
You can read the experience and viewpoints of outgoing POST intern, Fabiola Creed, here.
You will hopefully have seen numerous blog posts regarding the Health Research Authority’s (HRA) commitment to research transparency. This was prompted in response to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee report last year on clinical trials transparency, which showed that nearly half of clinical trials fail to publish their results. In their report, the committee made a number of recommendations to the Health Research Authority in order to rectify the situation.
The HRA have recently launched a consultation on their new draft strategy for research transparency – #MakeItPublic. You can find out more about the campaign here on their website where there are also pages outlining their plans and visions for this area of improvement.
If you would like to have your say and be a part of the consultation, BU has an internal survey you can complete. The survey will close on Friday 16th August and replies will be combined to create an institutional response.
BU staff can login below:
April’s Café Scientifique – Should we help machines understand and respond to our emotions?
Postgraduate Research Experience Survey (PRES) 2024 – 2 WEEKS LEFT
Working with The Conversation: online training session – Wednesday 8th May Public Engagement Opportunity: Share your research with the public at Café Scientifique
Apply for up to £1,000 to deliver an event and take part in a national festival of public engagement with research
MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships 2024
Research Information Network
Horizon Europe News – December 2023