PhD Students

Background
Alice graduated from the University of Leeds with a BSc (Hons) in Psychology in 2017. During her degree she undertook a placement with the YQSR Group as an honorary research assistant, during this time she developed an interest in patient safety. She is currently undertaking a PhD, funded by NIHR CLAHRC Yorkshire and Humber and the University of Leeds.

PhD overview
The project aims to establish the feasibility and effectiveness of using a self-affirmation intervention with nursing staff to help improve levels of wellbeing and patient safety. The intervention involves manipulations which affirm the self and aims to address the way individuals respond to threat. Self-affirmation interventions have been used in research previously to help improve levels of wellbeing, but have yet to be implemented for this purpose with nurses.

Research interests
Alice is broadly interested in the wellbeing of healthcare professionals, including the implications of poorer wellbeing i.e. patient safety, and looking at methods to support this.

Publications
Johnson, J., Johnson, O., Heyhoe, J., Fielder, C., & Dunning, A. (2018). Parent experiences and preferences when dysemlia is identified during the prenatal and perinatal periods: A qualitative study into family nursing care for rare diseases. Journal of Family Nursing, 24, 271-293. doi: 10.1177/1074840718772808

Background
Emma graduated from the University of Liverpool with a Combined Honours BSc (Hons) in Psychology and Business Management in 2015. She then went on to study an MSc in Organisational Psychology at the University of Manchester, graduating in 2016. Emma is now currently studying a PhD funded by the NIHR Patient Safety Translational Research Centre under the Workforce Engagement and Wellbeing theme.

Prior to beginning the PhD, Emma spent a year working as a research assistant at the Warwick Medical School. Emma’s previous dissertations have involved researching areas of burnout, motivation, commitment and violence within student medics and mental health nurses.

PhD overview
The aim is to investigate what the current emotional climate is upon maternity wards in Bradford and Leeds. Research has found that when working relationships falter, the quality of care provided is impacted. However, the role of emotion within this is relatively ignored. This research aims to monitor the emotional climate and the level of safety within maternity. The end goal is to create an intervention which aims to encourage a positive work climate, so that staff feel comfortable expressing concerns and are aware of how their emotions affect others within the team.

Research interests
Emotion; Social Emotion; Emotional Expression; Health and Wellbeing; Stress; Resilience; Patient Safety; Teams; Working Relationships; Communication; Health and Occupational Psychology; Quality Improvement in Healthcare; Health Behaviour Change; Human Factors.

Background
Lauren has a background in Psychology, graduating from the University of Leeds with a BSc (Hons). Lauren is currently studying for a PhD with the University of Leeds and Bradford Institute for Health Research funded by the NIHR Yorkshire and Humber Patient Safety Translational Research Centre under the research theme Patient Involvement in Patient Safety.

Prior to beginning her PhD, Lauren spent a year working with the team at Bradford Institute for Health Research assisting in various projects aiming to improve the quality and safety of care in the NHS. She also worked as a research assistant on a European Randomised Controlled Trial (RCT) at The University of Leeds, and at Inhealthcare helping to develop digital health solution for the NHS.

PhD overview
Lauren is completing a PhD which is focused on understanding how staff use and respond to patient feedback to inform improvements to the quality and safety of care in a hospital setting. NHS policy and guidance highlights the important and unique perspective of patients, and the potential value of their feedback in informing improvements to care. In light of this, the healthcare service is increasingly collecting feedback from patients, with collection often being mandated across many aspects of care. Despite this, recent research suggests that there is not enough being done with patient feedback to use it to inform meaningful change. Based on the findings from a systematic literature review Lauren completed, the PhD adopts an exploratory approach to focus more specifically on patient-initiated online feedback, how this is responded to and how it is used in practice to inform improvement.

Research interests
Lauren has a general research interest in the quality and safety of care in the NHS. More specifically, Lauren is interested in how both digital health technologies and patient involvement in patient care can help to alleviate pressures on the NHS, and improve the quality and safety of care for both patients and staff. Lauren also has a particular interest in how qualitative methodological approaches can help to answer key research questions in this area.

Publications
Johnson, J., Panagioti, M., Bass, J., Ramsey, L., & Harrison, R. (2016). Resilience to emotional distress in response to failure, error or mistakes: A systematic review. Clinical psychology review.

Background
Luke completed his BSc in Psychology at the University of Liverpool in 2014. Here, he developed a strong interest in the application of psychological theory in healthcare, before completing his MSc in psychological approaches to health at the University of Leeds in 2015. Continuing his studies at Leeds, Luke is currently undertaking an NIHR CLAHRC Yorkshire and Humber sponsored PhD in Behavioural Medicine. There are many complex routes through which lifestyle behaviours may have a deleterious impact on health. Luke’s thesis focuses on one, perhaps lesser known route: the impact of pre-surgical (preoperative) lifestyle behaviours on the outcomes of elective surgery operations. More specifically, he is focusing on the impact of one behaviour: recreational substance use. Luke’s thesis aims to i. assess the risk of preoperative substance use and ii. begin to develop a counteractive preoperative behaviour change intervention. The former to understand the scale and impact of the issue, the latter to help mitigate patient morbidity during the post-surgery (postoperative) period.

Research interests
Perioperative interventions; Substance use and addiction; Behaviour change

Publications
Budworth L. Electronic cigarettes: Sensory cues in nicotine dependence. PsyPAG Quarterly. 2018. [accepted for publication].

Taylor J, Budworth L. Food safety culture: Patterns and trends from a quantitative analysis of a culture assessment program. Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes. 2018; 10(3). doi: 10.1108/WHATT-02-2018-0007.

Prestwich A, Moore S, Kotze A, Budworth L, Lawton R, Kellar, I. How can smoking cessation be induced before surgery? A systematic review and meta-analysis of behaviour change techniques and other intervention characteristics. Frontiers in Psychology. 2017. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00915.

Background
Raabia graduated from the University of Bradford with a BSc (Hons) in Psychology in 2015. She went on to study an MSc in Psychological approaches to Health at the University of Leeds (2016). Raabia is currently undertaking a PhD, funded by NIHR CLAHRC Yorkshire and Humber and the University of Leeds.

PhD overview
Raabia is completing a PhD which focuses on supporting healthcare professionals with the disclosure of adverse events to patients. The Duty of Candour regulation which was introduced within the UK in 2015 states that every healthcare professional has a professional responsibility to be open and honest with patients when something that goes wrong with their treatment or care. Despite these policy advancements and implementation around open disclosure, there is currently limited training available for healthcare professionals on disclosure. This project involves developing and assessing the feasibility and acceptability of a communication intervention to support maternity healthcare professionals with this disclosure process.

Research interests
Raabia has a general interest in improving the quality and safety of care within the NHS, with a specific focus on improving the delivery of service to patients and enhancing the wellbeing of healthcare professionals.

Background
Siobhan graduated from the University of Cambridge with a BA (Hons) in Natural Science in 2005, and then from the University of Durham with a BSc (Hons) in Psychology in 2007. She completed a Masters in Psychology, graduating from the University of Northumbria in Newcastle in 2009. Following her degree, Siobhan worked as a research assistant on a number of projects encompassing various areas of health psychology, primarily the use of patient reported outcome measures following surgical and medical interventions. She is currently undertaking a PhD funded by NIHR CLAHRC Yorkshire and Humber and the University of Leeds.

PhD overview
Siobhan will evaluate the process of video-reflexive ethnography to determine whether this can be used to improve elements of teamwork and communication in high-risk multi-disciplinary healthcare teams. The research will focus on multi-disciplinary handovers in UK maternity units. The project will consider elements of feasibility and acceptability of video-reflexive ethnography in healthcare staff, as well as the sustainability of any improvements.

Research interests
Video-reflexive ethnography; multi-disciplinary handover; teamwork; communication; patient safety; quality improvement; qualitative methods; human factors research.

Background
I have been a trainee doctor in North Yorkshire since 2012, currently working at York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. I have had a growing interest in patient safety and healthcare improvement/quality improvement (QI) science. Having undertaken many QI projects I completed the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Improvement Coach Program in Boston in 2016. I am an Improvement Fellow with the Improvement Academy and member of Q (The Health Foundation).

I am interested in all areas of patient safety and healthcare improvement, and particularly in building capacity and capability in frontline healthcare staff. I have developed training programmes for junior doctors and other frontline staff/teams (mutli-disciplinary).

I am an honorary lecturer for the Hull York Medical School, teaching 3rd and 5th year medical students (Bedside/Seminar/Simulation).

My PhD is supported by York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust (https://www.yorkhospitals.nhs.uk/)

PhD overview
I am interested in how we respond to errors and adverse events within healthcare; when and how we should investigate, how we decide what to do with the findings of an investigation and how we design, test and implement changes. My PhD is about how we produce more effective safety strategies from adverse incident investigation, but also more broadly how we respond to the findings of investigations.

Research interests
Patient Safety; Quality Improvement in Healthcare; Human Factors.