This page details ways that you can get involved in Rethink research projects and projects from other research departments within other organisations, charities and universities. If you would like to be involved in any of these research projects please do contact the relevant research department directly.
Please note that Rethink is not held accountable for any involvement that service users and carers have in research projects not run by Rethink. Similarly, findings of these research projects may not necessarily represent the views of Rethink.
What does recovery mean to you?
If you want to have your say then here’s an opportunity to take part in an exciting new national research at Rethink. The project is exploring the meaning of ‘recovery’ with people who have experience of mental illness to inform mental health service provision and user involvement. We are recruiting for people to come forward and share their experiences with us, so follow the link and get in touch.
Share your story (160 kb) ![[doc]](http://www.rethink.org/display_images/document_icons/doc.gif)
Rethink's New Research Panel
Rethink’s research panel has been established to ensure that service users and carers are at the centre of decision making, when it comes to deciding the research projects that we allow to recruit through Rethink. The panel is made up of ten service users and carers. All research projects which wish to recruit participants through Rethink must now go through this panel.
Further information can be obtained from Áine Duggan (Aine.Duggan@rethink.org) who is co-ordinating the panel for Rethink’s research team.
Mental Health and Survivor History
The Survivors History Group has now been working on the history of mental health users and their movement for over three years.
The attached Survivor History Newsletter (33 kb) will explain to you what we are doing and how you can join in. If we are to succeed in creating a history and an archive of the movement that all can use, we will need many skills from many people. Please read our leaflet and see how you could help. If you are able to publicise this project in any way, please do so.
Anybody with access to the internet can participate in our activities through the web and through email. For those who do not have internet access, we are setting up a postal mailing list for newsletters. In addition, we are looking into ways of organising meetings on survivor history in different parts of the United Kingdom, so that those working on this project can meet face to face.
If you want to know more about the Essex Conference, you should contact Ewen S. Speed esspeed@essex.ac.uk
Child Health and Development Study Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London
We would like to invite you and your child to take part in an important research study. The study investigates the health and development of children aged 7-12 years. One part of the study is looking at how children develop who have a relative with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder. One of the aims of this study is to understand how these children avoid developing schizophrenia in order for us to learn how to prevent in future.
You will be reimbursed for your time and travel expenses. All information will be treated as strictly confidential.
If you would like to take part or get more information about the study or would like to ask any questions, please contact Christina by telephone on 020 7848 0129, or by e-mail at Christina.Theodoridou@iop.kcl.ac.uk.
Do you have a mental health condition or you know someone with it?
Do you have doubts about treatment for mental health?
Swansea University in collaboration with the James Lind Alliance is conducting a survey to collect patients’, carers’ and clinicians’ uncertainties about the effect of treatments. Uncertainties are the doubts you may have about how effective the treatments you are undertaking are (e.g. psychotherapy, medication, complementary therapy etc. etc.).
By following the link below you can help us to identify questions so that research and clinical practice will be able to be improved effectively following patients’ and carers’ priorities.
http://www.medicine.swan.ac.uk/mentalhealthsurvey/
Positive Parenting at the University of Manchester
If you are a parent of a child between 3-10 years old and are also living with Bipolar Disorder, you might be interested in this study. Researchers at the University of Manchester are interested in finding out how parents with Bipolar Disorder cope with parenting. They are running an intervention study looking at people’s approaches to parenting and their children’s behaviour patterns.
This is an opportunity to try out a method called Triple P (the Positive Parenting Programme), which has helped many parents.
To find out more please visit: reachingabalance@manchester.ac.uk or contact Vaneeta Sadhnani on 0161 306 0418.
Debt and mental health: improving communication between users, carers, professionals and creditors
We are looking to recruit
(a) service users with experience/interest in personal debt, or (b) carers of someone who has experienced personal debt.
This is for an important new research project which will change practice in the banking and finance sector. For more information go to Debt and mental health (32 kb)
Service User Research Enterprise (SURE)
SURE is a research unit within the Institute of Psychiatry Health Services Research Department. They have conducted a range of research projects, some of which are user-led and some of which are collaborative projects with clinical academics at the Institute of Psychiatry. Click here to find out more about Service User Research Enterprise (SURE) ![[www]](http://www.rethink.org/display_images/document_icons/www.gif)
SURGE (Service User Research Group, England)
This is one part (or 'hub') of the NIMHE Mental Health Research Network. SURGE is run by a partnership between Shaping Our Lives, the Mental Health Foundation, Survivor Researcher Network, and the University of Brunel. It seeks to support and promote the involvement of mental health service users in all research undertaken within the MHRN, and is in the process of producing guidelines for the involvement of service users in research. Click here to find out more about Service User Research Group, England (SURGE)
This network of service users involved in training, education and research is coordinated at the University of Birmingham. They are actively involved in the Mental Health Research Network, which is part of the National Institute for Mental Health in England
User-Led Research
User-led research is where service users are in charge of carrying out the research. One of the organisations where this has been undertaken is at the Mental Health Foundation Strategy for Living Programme. A number of mental health service users were given training and support to carry out their own small-scale research projects; these were subsequently disseminated and many are on the Mental Health Foundation website. Rethink is hoping to be able to create opportunities for user-led research in the future.
