6th UK Implementation Science Research Conference
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PRESENter
Adele Pacini
presenter biography
Adele Pacini is a registered mindfulness teacher and chartered clinical psychologist specialising in older adult mental healthcare. She has a particular interest in the mental health needs of both carers and former carers. She holds academic affiliations with UCL and the Open University.
background
Parent carers of children with special educational needs have an increased risk of mental and physical ill-health [1,2]. It remains problematic to engage parent carers in wellbeing support [3], with many parents not perceiving themselves as ‘carers’ [4]. Following low uptake to our Mindfulness for Parent Carers (MPC) group we carried out a formative evaluation and utilised ecological theory aligned with public health goals as outlined by Atkins et al [5]. We examined whether expressions of interest (EOI), and applications to, the MPC group were increased by aligning the promotion of the group with parent carer’s identity and through settings that support that identity.
MEthod
For intake one, the course was promoted as ‘Mindfulness for Parent Carers’ via email, poster and telephone contacts to local carer charities, NHS services, and the voluntary action mailing list (a reach of 1,300 individuals). For intake two the course was promoted as ‘Mindfulness for Parents who Care’ via local workplace settings (18) and primary and secondary schools (397 including 15 special needs schools).
results
For the EOI questionnaire, fourteen people completed the EOI questionnaire for intake one, and seventeen people for intake two. The difference was not significant (X2(1) = 0.29 p = 0.59). For full applications, intake one had one application; intake two had six applications. There were significantly more applications made in intake two than intake one X2 (1) = 3.57, p = 0.05.
Conclusion
Aligning intervention promotional material with both parent carer’s primary identity (ie a parent first), and setting (ie schools/workplace) resulted in a significantly greater number of applications to the MPC group. However, numbers were low across both intakes, and thus more work is needed to understand how to work with parent carers and offer support how and when they need it.
References
1. Emerson, E. Mothers of children and adolescents with intellectual disability: social and economic situation, mental health status, and the self-assessed social and psychological impact of the child’s difficulties. J Intellect Disabil Res 2003;47:385–99. Available from doi:10.1046/j.1365-2788.2003.00498.x
2. Lee, M.H., Park, C., Matthews, A.K., et al. Differences in physical health, and health behaviors between family caregivers of children with and without disabilities. Disabil Health J 2017;10:565–70. Available from doi:10.1016/j.dhjo.2017.03.007
3. Moriarty, J., Manthorpe J., Cornes, M. Reaching out or missing out: approaches to outreach with family carers in social care organisations” Health Soc Care Community 23(1) 2015; 42-50. Available from doi: 10.1111/hsc.12119
4. O’Connor, D.L. Self-identifying as a caregiver: Exploring the positioning process. Journal of Aging Studies, 21(2) 2007, 165-174. Available from doi.org/10.1016/j.jaging.2006.06.002
5. Atkins, M.S. Rusch, D., Mehta, T.G., Lakind, D. Future Directions for Dissemination and Implementation Science: Aligning Ecological Theory and Public Health to Close the Research to Practice Gap. J Clin Child Adolesc Psychol, 45(2) 2016, 215-226. Available from doi:10.1080/15374416.2015.1050724