Who we are & how to take part

What is Fuse? 


Fuse brings together the five North East Universities of Durham, Newcastle, Northumbria, Sunderland and Teesside in an innovative collaboration to transform health and wellbeing and reduce health inequalities through the conduct of world-class public health research and its translation into value-for-money policy and practice.

The Centre provides a unique forum for researchers operating in a range of scientific disciplines to work with policy and practice partners from the NHS, local and national government, and voluntary and community sectors to help transform public health.

Find out about the events we run, the research we do, the people involved and how to join Fuse on our main website.


The blog


This blog is a forum for sharing our 'warts-and-all' experiences of doing and translating public health research. Posts differ in tone: some are written informally and others formally depending on the subject matter. However, we are not looking for posts that read like a reports or news items.

The most successful posts tend to reflect personal views/experiences and are written by one or two people rather than a group.  These often spark interesting discussion, both on-line and in person.

We hope that the blog provides an insight into public health research for those not directly involved by revealing what is going on ‘behind the scenes’: depicting the joys and frustrations, acting to inspire or provide support to others.

The blog is currently overseen and edited by a friendly group of Fuse members. We publish blog posts once a week (usually on a Friday) and publicise these via our main twitter account (@fuse_online) and Facebook page (www.facebook.com/fuseonline).

The views expressed in posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of Fuse (the Centre for Translational Research in Public Health) or the author's employer or organisation.


How to contribute


We welcome posts of 600-800 words from anyone involved in public health and are happy to discuss any ideas for posts with you.

Email your posts to Mark Welford (m.welford@tees.ac.uk), Fuse Communications Officer.

Still need convincing?  Then read this post on why you should blog.  If you can't think of anything to write, why not start with our 3 questions quiz?


Video introduction (optional) 


You could also consider introducing your post in a 20 second video.  Please do this on your mobile phone, holding the phone in landscape mode (the long way/horizontal, as opposed to upright/vertical/portrait). 

In your video please say:
  • Who you are;
  • What your role is and link to Fuse;
  • What your post is about; and
  • Encourage people to read and comment.
This doesn't need to be an Oscar winning performance, it's simply to entice people to read your post.  Here's an example by Nat Forster, which introduced this post: "Brands, bottles and breastfeeding: sharing stories of early motherhood"