Winner of the category Promoting Effective Care Processes & Standards was awarded to: Northumberland Tyne & Wear NHS Foundation Trust and Northumbria University for their research project "Is there a pathway to recovery through care coordination?"This NIHR funded emancipatory action research project had service user and carer (SU&C) engagement at its heart, reflected in the aims of the research to promote the critical evaluation of care coordination and recovery in mental health services.
Close links were forged between SU&C’s, NHS professionals, Northumbria University academics, the NIHR Mental Health Network and the voluntary sector to support the research process. The dissemination phase was designed to engage NHS professionals and the researchers in critical dialogue (a series of workshops) about how care coordination practice, within the requirements of Refocusing CPA, could be changed based on the research findings, thus challenging traditional boundaries and perspectives. The highly relevant research findings continue to challenge and inform the improvement of (improve) mental health practice and pathways.SU&C’s shared responsibility for the whole research process, influencing the design of the research, collecting and analysing the data, and being accountable for the results, their interpretation and dissemination. This went far beyond a consultation model to a genuinely co-produced piece of work at all stages of the research. Many participants interviewed by the SU’s and C’s were empowered through the research process to reflect on their own recovery journey and consider how they might engage differently with their care coordinator in the future, thus promoting further user engagement in care coordination practice.
An accredited research training course supported the collaboration and team work which characterised the research at all stages. The project went beyond engagement to empowerment as the service user and carer researchers represented concerns and recommendations for service improvements with staff at all levels of the mental health service organisation. They are continuing to be active, a website presenting the findings (in part inactively) has been launched entitled Recovery and Wellbeing through Involvement in Research and Evaluation (RWIRE) see www.rwire.co.uk.The practical and accessible nature of the findings have maintained all the stakeholders’ interest, they are generating further research questions as part of a funded Clinical Research Group.
The researchers are now leading further evaluations of recently established services and have contributed to the NIHR Good Practice Guidance for the recruitment and involvement of service user and carer researchers which is being adopted nationally.
The research has promoted authority and credibility among service users and carers and these researchers have used the research findings to re-design services. Thus there has been an organisational impact as well as an observable effect on the lives of the service users and carers involved.
The research has promoted authority and credibility among service users and carers and the researchers have used the research findings to work in partnership with professionals and managers to support the Trust wide re-design of services. Thus there has been an organisational impact as well as an observable effect on the lives of the service users and carers involved.
For further information visit http://www.cpaa.org.uk/