Research Projects

This project will extend the growing evidence base around social prescribing in the primary care and public health arenas by focussing on its use for children and young people (CYP), and in particular prevention and early intervention in mental health conditions, which are a key growing concern for primary care, public health and education services. 

Our project examines the use of community-based wellbeing activities for CYP as a potential prevention and early intervention pathway by: 

• Exploring how social prescribing schemes/pathways operate as a vehicle for assisting CYP to access, connect with and participate in community activities; and 
• Understanding how diverse types of community-based support can create the conditions to promote adolescents’ healthy social and emotional development. 

We will assess prevalence in three complementary analyses. The first will be an examination of mental health problems and changes from pre-pandemic amongst parent carers of children with SEND in the Mental Health of Children and Young People in England (MHCYP) surveys 2017, 2020 and 2021. The second will be an investigation of the mental health of mothers of children with SEND before and during the pandemic using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink (CPRD). The third will be an examination of the association of factors related to the caring role and mental health utilising survey data from the NIHR-funded Parent Carer Wellbeing Study. 

We will map pathways to identification, referral and support for mental health problems in parent carers in England; triangulating reports from parent carers, and professionals in social care, primary care, and children’s services. Qualitative interviews with parent carers will be conducted to learn about their experiences accessing support for their mental health. 

We hope that this project will provide information about the need and access to mental health services for parent carers, including the impact of the pandemic and regional variation. We plan for this project to lead to further research to develop and test strategies to overcome barriers to accessing evidence-based mental health treatment for parent carers with mental health problems. 

Start / end dates: April 2022 - March 2024

Contact email: g.j.bjornstad@exeter.ac.uk

COVID has worsened and deepened the longstanding mental health inequalities for ethnic minorities. Higher levels of anxiety and depression were reported in ethnic minorities across the pandemic, but they had less support from mental health services. This indicates a pressing need to understand what and how changes in using mental health services impact health outcomes of ethnic minorities, so practice will learn what and how services should be provided to satisfy people’s needs.  

This study aims to identify what changes happened to mental health services for adults during the pandemic, and how such changes affected ethnic minority groups. The findings will help the NHS to develop culturally appropriate care that meets the social, cultural, ethical, and religious needs of patients post-pandemic. 

Start / end dates: September 2022 - February 2024

Contact email: Yu.fu@liverpool.ac.uk / Yu.fu@newcastle.ac.uk

The NHS Community Mental Health Framework for Adults and Older Adults (2019) sets out a vision for place-based mental health support which integrates primary and secondary mental health services, public health, social care, and the third sector. However, many service users report a lack of integration across current services, and resultant difficulty accessing the support they need in a timely manner. 

This study aims to inform an integrated whole system approach to mental health improvement and reduction of mental health inequalities through improving connections between primary and secondary mental health services, public health, social care and the third sector. 

Start / end dates: January 2022 - March 2024

Contact email: judi.kidger@bristol.ac.uk

Severe mental illness (SMI), including schizophrenia, bipolar and other conditions, affects about 1 in 100 people in England. In recent years attention is increasingly being paid to how we can better support peoples’ physical health, with reports of how people with SMI die on average 20 years earlier than others in the general population. We know that many of the reasons behind this can, and must, be changed.   

Our research builds on the PRIMROSE programme, that developed and tested services to promote physical health (in particular cardiovascular health risk) in people with SMI. In these studies and subsequent work, nurses, health care assistants and peer coaches supported people living with SMI to identify and change factors that increased their risk of poor physical health (e.g., smoking, weight, alcohol misuse).  

By using surveys, interviews, workshops and observation, our research is examining how we can implement physical and holistic health support to people living with SMI in the North East of England. We are working with healthcare providers, experts by experience, and community service providers to look at what helps and hinders successful service delivery. We will compare approaches with ongoing implementation in other areas of the UK to ultimately identify how best to deliver services so that individuals with SMI can experience better physical and holistic health.   

Start / end dates: November 2021 - March 2025

Project members:

• Professor Emily Oliver (Principal Investigator) - emily.oliver@newcastle.ac.uk
• Dr Ilaria Pina (Research Associate) 
• Sue Webster (Peer Researcher) 
• Dan Steward (Research Assistant)