Making the most of waiting
8 November 2019
Ray Earwicker, a WCCEH friend, writes …
If time is a great healer, is waiting the problem?
Florence Nightingale (1859) certainly thought so. She saw it as bad for health – “apprehension, uncertainty, waiting (my italics), fear of surprise…do a patient more harm than any exertion.” It’s tiresome too, as the Kinks noted in 1965 and in the meantime, we’re all Waiting for Godot (who never comes). For health systems, waiting is a mark of inefficiency that undermines ‘customer’ confidence. It is a focus for targets and management expedients in a culture which expects action, now.
Read more on the Waiting Times blog
Centre seminar: A good death? The cultural contexts of palliative care
9 October 2019
The latest in the series of seminars run in partnership with the WHO Collaborating Centre for Culture and Health considered the question of a ‘good death’ and the cultural contexts of palliative care.
End of life care aims to help people live and die with dignity. Cultural norms, beliefs and expectations heavily influence how this can be achieved and what constitutes a ‘good death.’ This seminar considered the diverse relationships that exist between cultural contexts and palliative care practices.
The seminar was hosted by Dr Robin Durie, the Centre’s Deputy Director for Research. The speakers were Dr Samir Guglani, a poet, novelist and clinical oncologist, Dr Michael Flexer, Publicly Engaged Research Fellow with the Wellcome-funded Waiting Times project and Kelechi Anucha, a PhD student with the Waiting Times project.
Watch the video of the seminar.
Information about future seminars in the series can be found on the WHO Europe website.
Research Fellows’ and PhD Students’ Success
30 April 2019
The Wellcome Centre is incredibly proud of everyone who works with us but we want to highlight a few people who’s work has been in the spotlight.
Congratulations to ‘Waiting Times’, Michael Flexer and Kelechi Anucha
Michael Flexer, Publicly Engaged Research Fellow on the ‘Waiting Times’ project has won the 2019 Public Engagement Award from Birkbeck, University of London.
‘Waiting Times’ is funded by the Wellcome Trust and led by Prof. Laura Salisbury (Exeter) and Prof. Lisa Baraitser (Birkbeck).
Michael designed a series of storytelling workshops, ‘Messages in a Bottle’, in which users of the day hospice in Honiton shared stories of their experiences of time.
Michael delivered the workshops with Kelechi Anucha (PhD student on Waiting Times) and Hospicecare staff. Michael and Kelechi have offered the prize money (£150) back to the hospice, to be used to fund something that the users of the day hospice who collaborated in the research can enjoy.
The Birkbeck award committee particularly commended how the relationship with Hospicecare was carefully developed throughout the research process, making it an excellent example of engaged research. Dr Elliot Kendall, Director of Research (English and Film) congratulated Michael and Kelechi on this recognition of their impressive engaged research practice.
Engage Researchers Academy
Dr Charlotte Jones and Dr Michael Flexer have both won a place in the Engage Researchers Academy.
This is a year-long professional development programme that supports participants to develop their skills and experience in engagement and enhance the impact and relevance of their research.
We look forward to hearing more about the programme over the year, and benefiting from Charlotte and Michael’s experiences.
PhD Student collaborates on BBC ecodrama podcast
Our very own Alex Smalley has been working with the BBC’s ecodrama Forest 404 to understand how the sounds of nature might affect wellbeing. To take part in the study you can visit here, and to listen to Alex talk about it on BBC Radio Devon recently follow the link here
