The Research Room

With nearly 2.9 million people in the UK now economically inactive due to illness, how can we balance the drive for national productivity with the personal need for mental health recovery?

 

For the next episode in our mental health mini-series, we’re joined by Professor Rowena Jacobs and Professor Lina Gega to discuss the Support2Work project. This comprehensive national evaluation is investigating the impact of placing employment advisors directly into NHS Talking Therapies to help individuals navigate work-related challenges alongside their psychological treatment.

 

Listen as we chat about the staggering £200 billion annual cost of economic inactivity and whether combining practical job support with therapy offers better value for taxpayers than therapy alone. We explore the unique "UK-specific" nature of this crisis and how the team is using a mixed methods analysis and an elephant analogy to translate complex health economics into life-changing policy.

 

Tune in to hear how the project’s name, suggested by a service user, won over our hosts, and how these practical pathways to impact are helping to bridge the gap between clinical care and the labour market!

 

Find out more about Support2work: https://www.york.ac.uk/che/mental-health/support2work/

In settings where mental health specialists are scarce, how can we ensure patients get the care they need?

 

For our first episode in our May mental health mini-series, we’re joined by Dr Mehreen Faisal and Karen Coales to discuss the SPiRiT-D project. This innovative hybrid trial is bridging the mental health treatment gap in Pakistan by testing a collaborative care model to deliver evidence-based talking therapy with non-mental health professionals.

 

Listen as we chat about how to reach underserved communities, and how the team has culturally adapted their support to ensure it resonates with local patients. Stick around for our random research questions to find out why a little 'Chaos and Patience' is all you need to change the world of mental health!

 

Find out more about SPiRiT-D: https://www.impactsouthasia.com/  

Read the Protocol Paper: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13063-026-09453-5 

 

Music by Matthew Bailey

Is an ounce of prevention really worth a pound of cure when it comes to mental health? 

That’s the big question we’re tackling this week as we go on the road! We’ve left the comfort of The Research Room studio and headed to The Milner Hotel in York for the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration (ARC)’s An ounce of prevention: How can the NHS make a transition towards prevention in mental health? Event.

With the NHS 10-Year Plan officially prioritising a shift toward preventative mental health care, we wanted to find out how researchers are working hard to make this happen. Armed with our brand-new portable mics, and with the fantastic help of Emma Standley and Heidi Benyair we joined a packed house of leading experts and researchers to bring you insights from a fantastic range of projects.

 

Find out more about the ARC Yorkshire & Humber: https://arc-yh.nihr.ac.uk/

Find our more about the Mental Health and Addiction Research Group (MHARG) at the University of York: https://www.york.ac.uk/healthsciences/research/mental-health/ 

 

Featured Interviews:

01:00 Professor Simon Gilbody - What is the day all about? Prevention in Mental Health: Aligning Evidence and the 10 Year Plan

04:00 Kate Robinson Knowledge Mobilisation Lead in the ARC with Yorkshire and Humber. Find out more: https://arc-yh.nihr.ac.uk/training/an-introduction-to-knowledge-mobilisation-practical-training/ 

08:31 Professor John Wright (Director of Bradford Institute of Health Research) Chief Investigator of Born in Bradford Project. Find out more: https://borninbradford.nhs.uk/ 

11:36 Dr Ruth Wadman (University of Bradford)  - Promoting Positive Adolescent Mental Health (PPAMH!) for School Climate - Feasibility Trial. Find out more: https://borninbradford.nhs.uk/what-we-do/studies/promoting-positive-adolescent-mental-health/ 

15:56 Kim Bevan and Amy Bedingham  from Tend VR - Feasibility and efficacy of a Virtual Reality Mindfulness Based Intervention for depression and anxiety. Find out more: https://www.tendmentalhealth.com/ 

21:58 Dr John Pickavance (Bradford Institute for Health Research)   The  IRL Trial : A School-Based RCT Investigating the Effects of Social Media Restrictions on the Mental Health of Under-16s (12-15 year olds) Find out More: https://bradfordresearch.nhs.uk/the-irl-trial/ 

25:55 Professor Dave McDaid  (Associate Professor at the London School of Economics)  - The Economics of Prevention: Is an ounce of Prevention Worth a Pound of Cure? Making the economic case for investing in prevention.  Find out more: https://www.lse.ac.uk/people/david-mcdaid 

28:22 Professor Scott Welch and Dr Joe Hulin (Research Fellow in Mental Health at the University of Sheffield) - Improving Suicide Prevention in Primary Care

35:01 Professor Claire Henderson (King’s College London) RECOLLECT - Recovery Colleges Characterising and Testing  . An adult education approach for learning to live with mental health conditions. Find out more: https://www.researchintorecovery.com/research/recollect/ 

45:17 Dr Philip Kerrigan (University of York)  From Manual to Mobile: A Digital Behavioural Activation Tool to Improve Mood in Adolescents During and Post-Therapy. The COMBAT Trial. Find out more: https://combatdepression.org/ 

52:24 Dr Trish Darcy - Nature-based Interventions to support mental health- Natural Environments and Health      

54:27 Dr Colin Palmer (Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health) Breath Education: Building youth mental health prevention infrastructure in schools. Find out more: https://breathe-edu.co.uk/ 

58: 25 Eloise Ryde and Pip Shaw -  PRIMROSE : Evaluating interventions to reduce cardiovascular disease risk in people living with severe mental illness

61:01 Aaron Wood and Stephanie Matteo (Seven Hills Research Clinic) Tertiary Prevention in Mood Disorders: establishing a specialist research clinic

65:09 Jo Orchard - Organiser of the event.

65:35 Professor Simon Gilbody  - A summary of the day.

Music by Matthew Bailey

Can we reduce the mental health impact of war?

This week in The Research Room, we’re venturing outside of the Department of Health Sciences once again! We're joined by Samantha Holmes from the York Law School and the Centre for Applied Human Rights for a fascinating look into the world of international law and conflict-related mental harm.

Sam shares her research as part of the Beyond Compliance Consortium (BCC), a global partnership investigating how to minimise civilian suffering during armed conflict. Using a qualitative approach, centered on the lived experiences of local communities across nine case-study countries, Sam's research explores how the reality of war impacts mental wellbeing and aims to uncover better ways to protect civilians and respond to the suffering caused by conflict.

Plus discover how the team is using gamification to turn complex research findings into an interactive mobile game!

 

Find out more about the BCC: https://beyond-compliance-consortium.org/ 

Listen to the BCC Podcast: https://beyond-compliance-consortium.org/podcast/

 

Music by Matthew Bailey

Happy Easter from The Research Room! We're taking a break for Easter this week and as it is The National Autistic Society's World Autism Acceptance Month we're re-visiting one of our favourite episodes from last year, The ASSSIST 2 Trial!

 

Dr. Kerry Bell and Dr. Jane Blackwell join us to chat about this fantastic trial, completed in 2022, which explored whether Social Stories™ could be an effective way to support autistic children at school. We discuss the ins and outs of the trial, the challenges they faced, especially when COVID threw a curveball their way and, excitingly, they even have results to share!

 

Resources & Links from this Episode

For more information about the ASSSIST 2 project, email [email protected] or [email protected]  

Find out more about the ASSSIST 2 on the project website: https://www.york.ac.uk/healthsciences/research/trials/ytutrialsandstudies/archive/asssist-2/

Check out the full trial findings here: https://acamh.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/camh.12740 

Watch the ASSSIST 2 trial come to life in this animation: https://youtu.be/NX0z6INrzdo?feature=shared 

Read the NIHR HTA report for the project here: https://www.journalslibrary.nihr.ac.uk/hta/JBTM8017 

 

Music by Matthew Bailey