Tagged / Health

New paper by BU’s Lecturer in International Health

international, open access, Publishing, writing

Congratulations to Dr. Pramod Regmi on the publication of his latest article ‘Local elections and community health care in Nepal’.[1]  Pramod is our newly appointed Lecturer in International Health, who started this post exactly a month ago.  The editorial, co-authored with BU Visiting Faculty Prof. Padam Simkhada (based at Liverpool John Moores University), Nirmal Aryal (based at the University of Otago, New Zealand) and CMMPH’s Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen, highlights the important link between local democracy and health in Nepal.

The paper argues that elected local governments are critical for public accountability on the operationalization of the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) at local level.  Furthermore, having elected leaders in communities after such a long gap will certainly give Nepalese people rights and hopefully improve provision and access to health care services they are entitled to. Thus the role of civil society, community-based non-governmental organisation, development partners and the mass-media is critical in both advocacy for, and the effective monitoring and implementation of, local activities.

The paper appeared today in Health Prospect an Open Access journal published in English in Nepal as part of the Nepal Journals Online (NepJOL) service .

 

Reference

  1. Regmi, P., van Teijlingen, E., Simkhada, P., Aryal, N. (2017) Local elections and community health care in Nepal, Health Prospect: Journal of Public Health, 16(2):1-2.

The slow process from public health research to law

international, Publishing, writing

We know that public health works and thinks long-term. We’ll typically see the population benefits of reducing health risks such as tobacco use, obesity and high alcohol intake in ten or twenty years’ time.  But we often forget that preceding public health research into the determinants of ill health and the possible public health solutions is also slow working.  Evidence-based public health solutions can be unpopular with voters, politicians or commercial companies (or all).  Hence these take time to get accepted by the various stakeholders and make their way into policies.

I was, therefore, glad to see that Scotland won the Supreme Court case today in favour of a minimum price for a unit of alcohol. As we know from the media, the court case took five years.  Before that the preparation and drafting of the legislation took years, and some of the original research took place long before that.  Together with colleagues at the Health Economic Research Unit at the University of Aberdeen, the University of York and Health Education Board for Scotland, we conducted a literature review on Effective & Cost-Effective Measures to Reduce Alcohol Misuse in Scotland as early as 2001 [1].  Some of the initial research was so long ago it was conducted for the Scottish Executive, before it was even renamed the Scottish Government.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

 

Reference:

Research started years ago! Ludbrook et al.(2002) Effective & Cost-Effective Measures to Reduce Alcohol Misuse in Scotland: Lit Review, HERU, Univ. of Aberdeen. [ISBN: 0755932803] http://www.gov.scot/Resource/Doc/1124/0052548.pdf

REMINDER – Cross-Research Council Mental Health Network Plus call Meeting

Funding opportunities, Guidance

Just a quick reminders…

We will be holding a networking event for BU academics who are interested in the Cross-Research Council Mental Health Network Plus call on 1st November 09:30-11:30 in PG140. It will be a chance to get like-minded people in one space to identify possible collaborations and differences.

No preparation is necessary for the meeting; however we would ask you to read the call guidance see here.

Refreshment will be provided, if you would like attend please contact Alexandra Pekalski or Lisa Gale Andrews.

SAIL Project Team Meeting

Knowledge Exchange

Last week, Prof Ann Hemingway,  Prof Adele Ladkin  and Dr Holly Crossen-White joined European research colleagues in Ostend, Belgium for a SAIL Project bi-annual team meeting. Over two days  all research partners from four different European countries had the opportunity to share their initial research data from pilot projects being developed within each country for older people. The BU team will be undertaking the feasibility study for the SAIL project and will be drawing together all the learning from the various interventions created by the other partners.

 

 

BU Briefing – Fatigue management programme for people with multiple sclerosis

Our BU briefing papers are designed to make our research outputs accessible and easily digestible so that our research findings can quickly be applied – whether to society, culture, public policy, services, the environment or to improve quality of life. They have been created to highlight research findings and their potential impact within their field. 

The manualised group-based programme called FACETS (Fatigue: Applying Cognitive behavioural and Energy effectiveness Techniques to lifeStyle) is a conceptual framework integrating elements from cognitive behavioural, social-cognitive, energy effectiveness, self-management and self-efficacy theories. The aim of the intervention is to help people with multiple sclerosis (MS) normalise their fatigue experiences, learn helpful ways of thinking about fatigue and use available energy more effectively.

This paper presents the results from one year follow-up data obtained from a pragmatic three-centre trial of FACETS.

Click here to read the briefing paper.

For more information about the research, contact Professor Peter Thomas at pthomas@bournemouth.ac.uk or Roger Baker at rbaker@bournemouth.ac.uk.
To find out how your research output could be turned into a BU Briefing, contact research@bournemouth.ac.uk.

New CMMPH midwifery publication

international, Publishing, writing

Congratulations to Dr. Sue Way and Prof. Vanora Hundley in BU’s Centre for Midwifery, Maternal & Perinatal Health (CMMPH) on their latest publication on the latent phase of labour.  Their paper ‘Defining the latent phase of labour: is it important?’ appeared in Evidence Based Midwifery and was written with midwifery colleagues across the UK, Germany and Canada [1].

 

Congratulations

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

 

Reference:

  1. Hundley V, Way S, Cheyne H, Janssen P, Gross M, Spiby H (2017) Defining the latent phase of labour: is it important? Evidence Based Midwifery 15 (3): 89-94. 

 

Industrial Partnership Awards (IPAs) through the BBSRC- DEADLINE: 17/01/18

The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) have announced the Industrial Partnership Awards (IPAs), a scheme that encourages significant involvement with industry partners.  The scheme allows companies registered in the UK, or who have a UK R&D/manufacturing site to work equally on research with academic partners.  Companies from outside the UK may be worked with on a case by case basis.

Companies are expected to contribute at least 10% of the overall budget as cash. Funding is only available for organisations eligible for BBSRC support; IPA projects are normally funded in preference to standard grants of equivalent scientific merit.

Responsive mode priorities include:

  • Food, nutrition and health
  • Healthy ageing across the lifecourse
  • Reducing waste in the food chain
  • Technology development for the biosciences

The deadline for the scheme is 17 January 2018, at 16:00. For further advice, please contact Ehren Milner (emilner@bournemouth.ac.uk).

 

AHRC-MRC Global Public Health: Global Challenge Research Fund Partnership Awards Call 2

Funding opportunities

The Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) offers a unique opportunity for the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and the MRC to launch a global public health initiative that responds to the challenge of bringing together expertise in medical science and health interventions in developing countries, with arts and humanities research bringing an understanding of local knowledge and history, cultural and historical contexts and dynamics, community engagement, and trust.

The aim of this activity is to build inter-disciplinary research capacity and capability and to support research innovation across the MRC and AHRC communities. Successful applications will build and strengthen UK and international research collaboration and partnerships for global public health benefit. In order not to limit the potential for inter-disciplinary innovation under this call the call is open to proposals addressing any global public health issue affecting low and middle income countries.

The total funding available for this call from MRC and AHRC is £2million

Closing Date: 26/10/2017

For further details, please click here

Congratulations to Dr. Jane Fry & colleagues

international, open access, Publishing, Research Ethics, Research Integritiy, writing

Congratulations to Jane Fry, Janet Scammell and Sue Barker  in the Faculty of Health & Social Science on the publication of their latest paper ‘ Drowning in Muddied Waters or Swimming Downstream?: A Critical Analysis of Literature Reviewing in a Phenomenological Study through an Exploration of the Lifeworld, Reflexivity and Role of the Researcher’.

This innivative paper proceeds from examining the debate regarding the question of whether a systematic literature review should be undertaken within a qualitative research study to focusing specifically on the role of a literature review in a phenomenological study. Along with pointing to the pertinence of orienting to, articulating and delineating the phenomenon within a review of the literature, the paper presents an appropriate approach for this purpose. How a review of the existing literature should locate the focal phenomenon within a given context is illustrated by excerpts from the literature review within a descriptive phenomenological study. This article was recently published in the Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology.  Click here for freely available copy online.

 

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

Research funding for behavioural insights in health care – New call from the Health Foundation

Funding opportunities

The Health Foundation are inviting researchers to submit ideas rooted in ‘behavioural insights’ or ‘nudge theory’ that have the potential to increase efficiency and reduce waste within health care services in the UK.

There is £1.8 million available for up to eight multidisciplinary research teams to generate new knowledge of what can motivate people to act in more efficient and less wasteful ways in health care services.

Each project will receive between £150,000 and £350,000 for research completed over two to three years.

The three priority areas of focus for this programme include:

  • patient pathways: eg improving patient flow within the system, improving coordination and transfer of care, expediting discharge
  • procurement, pharmacy and medicines optimisation: eg minimising cost and waste in procurement and prescribing, improving medication adherence
  • care best practice: eg encouraging attendance, uptake of screening and health promotion, reducing unnecessary or ineffective care, better demand management, reducing harms.

The closing date for applications is 12:00, Friday 20 October 2017.

Find out more here.

BU Briefing – It was only a mild concussion

Our BU briefing papers are designed to make our research outputs accessible and easily digestible so that our research findings can quickly be applied – whether to society, culture, public policy, services, the environment or to improve quality of life. They have been created to highlight research findings and their potential impact within their field.

Sports concussion has been the subject of much discourse in the scientific literature and mainstream media for many years. Major national and international sporting events are extensively covered by the media, with vast numbers of column inches and webpages dedicated to summarising these events. The frequency of concussion in some of the world’s biggest sports such as soccer, football, and rugby means that many of these concussive events which occur in high-profile competitions are also the focus of this reporting.

This paper analyses the descriptions of online sports concussion news on a global scale, using a search engine to retrieve news stories, and evaluates the media’s role in shaping public perception and misconception regarding concussion in sport. Further analysis sought to identify geographical patterns associated with different descriptions of sports concussion.

Click here to read the briefing paper.

For more information about the research, contact Dr Osman Ahmed at ahmedo@bournemouth.ac.uk.
To find out how your research output could be turned into a BU Briefing, contact research@bournemouth.ac.uk.