Social care research partnership launches
Posted on 20 August 2020
Areas of work are likely to include relationship-centred care, understanding and evaluating the impacts of home care, and the homecare workforce. The programme will make a significant contribution to the evidence-base on this key, but less understood, aspect of social care.
Well-being in older age is a global priority, with 2020 marking the beginning of the World Health Organisation’s decade of action on healthy ageing. Many countries, including the UK, face the challenge of ensuring that older people age well. Key to this is making sure older people’s health and social care needs are met. The partnership will bring together the research expertise of the University’s Social Policy Research Unit (based in the Department of Social Policy and Social Work), and Home Instead’s wealth of experience as a major provider of home care in the UK and internationally. Together we hope to contribute to national debate and policy on how best to ensure older people age well.
Mark Laing, Director of Innovation at Home Instead Senior Care, said:
“The home care sector is constantly growing and evolving. Particularly in a post-pandemic world we have seen the vitally important role that being cared for in your own home environment can make in the quality of care provided to our vulnerable seniors.
“The three-year research partnership will provide the social care sector with an evidenced-based view of homecare, helping to shape what home care looks like in the future. It will also inform the national debate on supporting seniors and forms part of our continued commitment to invest in the future of home care innovation.”
Lead researcher at York, Professor Bryony Beresford said:
“Health and social care are equally important to the wellbeing and quality of life of older people. Covid-19 has highlighted for all of us the critical role of social care in the lives of many older people - those living in their own and in care homes. Recruitment for a Home Instead Research Fellow to build the research programme is now underway, and we are excited to begin working with Home Instead to develop a programme of research on homecare grounded in the priorities of older people and the sector”.