A public partner’s guide to podcasting

Posted by Victoria Bartle, Fuse Public Partner, with tips for guests from Cassey Muir, Fuse & NIHR School for Public health Research (SPHR) funded PhD Researcher from Newcastle University

Everyone seems to have a podcast these days and there are lots discussing research, but how many can say that they are totally led by the public? I have been participating in public involvement in research since 2016 and believe that it is a vital part of improving everybody’s health, but find that getting other people involved and informing the public about research projects is really difficult.

I was excited to be involved with the Fuse podcast Public Health Research and Me as I’ve wanted to start my own for a while now, and felt as if this would be a perfect opportunity to learn about podcasting and give it a try, as well as being part of creating a platform to help engage the public in research and hopefully increase awareness and involvement. I joined the podcast team made up mainly of other public partners and took part in some excellent training which went through equipment, hints and tips for selecting guests, how to phrase and deliver questions, different podcast formats, as well as recording and editing. I was buzzing after the training and keen to get started.

 

I was lucky enough to be selected to be the first host for the podcast and was matched with Cassey Muir, one of the Fuse researchers who is working with children and young people who have been affected by parental substance use. Her work is fascinating and I was soon enthralled reading everything I could to prep for the interview and come up with a very long list of questions. As brevity is not my forte the rest of the team helped to cut these down to around five or six questions which is about all that you need to create a 30 minute podcast.

We then had a pre-record meeting with Cassey, where we discussed the questions. Talking to her about her work helped me to edit and refine the questions for the interview. Once the questions had been finalised and approved by the podcast team and Cassey, we set a recording date.

I was quite nervous before the record. I’d been a panel member on a podcast before and had so many technical issues that I was really stressed and anxious by the time I managed to get everything sorted. So for this recording I made sure I had tried all of the equipment and was all set up with my notes, drinks, tissues and cough medicine…because of course I had a cold! Recording when one of the presenters keeps coughing is really difficult for the editor, but Cassey was a pro and kept pausing whenever I coughed so that we would have a second or two to edit it out. We talked for ages and the record went really well. I was able to bring in some of my own lived experience of the topic and this helped to make the conversation more natural and less like me firing questions at Cassey, although I did say “wow” and “that’s amazing” a lot which I was determined not to do as much the next time.

Now to the technical part! Although we had had some training on editing podcasts, the team decided to use an external editor as we wanted it to sound as professional as possible, and none of us were confident in using the software just yet. Listening to the edited version we were able to make requests for changes, but I felt that it generally sounded great, and asking to cut out all of my embarrassing “wows” was my own issue and not necessary. We had to write our bios to go with the podcast, an overview of what it was about, and make sure that the projects and references that we discussed were all available for the listeners to link to directly from the podcast page.

Going live was exciting, I sent the link to all of my friends and family, it was tweeted on the Fuse twitter feed and is also on the Fuse website so everyone can access it. We’ve had over 100 listens and the bonus video has had nearly 300 views so far. I’ve had lovely feedback from my friends and family who said they found it really interesting. My Mum was especially impressed as she now has something that she understands to tell people when she’s trying to explain what public involvement in research is and what I do.

Round two  

The second recording went a bit differently. I had loads of background information to read about Eugene Milne, his career history, his involvement in establishing Fuse, his role in public health and his recent MBE which was all very exciting. I had lots of questions about all of the different projects that he had been involved in, their impact on public health in the North East, as well as his plans for retirement, but during the pre-record chat I decided to take a more focused direction as his responses to some of the topics were just so interesting. We narrowed it down to his involvement in establishing Fuse, what his initial expectations were and how he feels it has developed over the past 15 years; the impressive results from the public health initiatives that he oversaw (including North East tobacco and alcohol control programmes Fresh and Balance); as well as responding to Covid-19 during his time as the Director of Public Health for Newcastle.

Again the public partner team reviewed the questions and the theme of the podcast and we went ahead with the recording. This time I didn’t have a cough which made recording much easier, but I still responded with lots of “wow’s” and “that’s amazing” as I found Eugene very engaging and his career so interesting. I then got myself a bit confused towards the end of the record. I’d skipped a question as it didn’t fit with how the conversation was flowing, but I wanted to come back to it at the end. I’d already said the outro lines so I had to pause for a second or two, ask the missed question, and then remind the editor to swap the order of the last two sections around. I was a bit embarrassed about this, but it was absolutely fine and you can’t tell in the final version.

Things don’t always go to plan

The third recording with PhD student Joanne McGrath has been different again. We had already decided to focus on one of Joanne’s current projects looking at women experiencing homelessness as it fitted in with International Women’s Day and an event that Fuse was hosting for the occasion. This meant that I had a bit less reading to do while prepping the questions this time. They were approved by the podcast team and Joanne, and she steered the direction of the podcast from the outset as she knows her research best and which areas are being focused on currently. The recording has been beset with challenges, technical issues, diary clashes and unavoidable life events that have meant that we have had to postpone the recording three times. Is it cursed!?

These challenges actually led us to writing this blog, as well as the hints and tips below. We have all learnt so much from the first three podcasts and as I pass the hosting responsibilities to the next public partner we wanted to make sure that we were learning from our experiences. At the point of writing this blog, we have now managed to record Joanne’s episode, so keep an eye out for it. Her work with women experiencing homelessness is so important and will benefit an often overlooked group of people by supporting positive changes in their lives.

Our top tips for podcasting

For hosts

Preparing for the podcast:

• Give yourself enough time to read through all of the guest’s work and discuss with them and the team the possible theme of the interview.
• Write down all the questions you can think of; you can always edit and rearrange the order later.
• Have a pre-record meeting with the guest; this helps you and your guest to feel comfortable, and to try out the microphone and recording platform. This can also help to define the questions and theme of the podcast.
• After the guest and the team have reviewed the questions and decided on five or six to use, arrange them in an order that should flow like a conversation.
• Write your own intro, a couple of sentences about yourself to introduce you to the listeners and practice this a few times so that you are familiar and comfortable saying it.
• Also practice the intro and outro sections that have already been created, changing some of the words if it fits better with how you speak.

The podcast recording:

• Login to the meeting for the record early, have everything you need set up around you, and make sure you have all devices on silent so you won’t be disturbed.
• Check the mic in advance, you may need a USB port to attach to your computer and headphones with a connector jack. If you use an Apple Mac (or similar) you may have to use a USB adapter.
• Place the mic approximately 15cm (6”) in front of you.
• Find a small quiet room that is preferably well furnished to absorb any echo.
• Have a little chat with the guest, try to make them feel comfortable and start when you’re both ready.
• Mute yourself if you need to cough, sneeze or drink etc.
• Avoid rustling any paper or notes that you may have prepared.
• Turn off non-essential devices using wifi and reduce the tabs/windows on your device. This will reduce the likelihood of buffering during the Zoom/Teams call.
• If you do cough, sneeze or make a mistake then pause for a second or two and start again (or mark by saying “edit point”), this gives the editor a space to remove the noise.

After the recording:

• Re-record any sections you feel necessary, or let the team know if you think a section will need to be moved, cut or edited and they can pass this on to the editor.
• Once the edited version comes back, with the “umms”, “aaahhhhs”, coughs (etc.) removed, you will be able to listen through and request any further edits that you’d like.
• Write a bio and provide a photo to go on the podcast platform.
• Help with any promotion through your own networks, and enjoy listening!

For guests

Preparing for the podcast:

• Identify and share your relevant publications, resources, and information with the host and podcast team, which allows them to focus the conversation and questions (e.g., do you want to provide a wide variety of resources or only those on a specific topic?).
• Help clarify any specific points of interest or themes you would like to get across about your work as this will help with determining relevant questions.
• Pre-record meetings and/or emails are helpful, which can take away some of the nerves by building a relationship with the host or testing out the equipment.
• Ask for a copy of the questions if you would like to make notes and think about your answers ahead of time.

The podcast recording:

• This should be/is a fun experience where you get to talk about your work with someone who is keen to listen and explore different topics with you. It is a great chance to discuss your research in a way that you might not normally and possibly from a different viewpoint, so try to ease into it and enjoy it. If you lose your train of thought or stumble over your words it is okay, that is the benefit of editing and not being live.
• If you have made them, have your notes to hand, either printed (but not rustling) or on the screen to help you remember important points that you want to make during the podcast.
• As this is meant to be somewhat conversational, remember to go with the flow of questioning as some of your answers may spark interesting follow-up questions that you are unprepared for.

After recording:

• Ensure you have provided links to the important items you discussed during the podcast, which can then be shared alongside the podcast.
• You get to listen/watch through the edited podcast before it goes live, which is your chance to highlight any changes you would like to be made (although the editing team do a fab job, so there may be no necessary changes at this stage).
• Once the podcast is live, this is a great opportunity to share your work and the podcast with relevant networks and/or on your social media.
• Enjoy listening or watching the podcast!

How I chanced upon the 70 year War in Public Health: Aye vs Nay for Water Fluoridation

Guest post by Priyanka Vasantavada, PhD student, School of Health and Social Care, Teesside University

Exactly a year ago to this day, I embarked on my PhD at Teesside University. Little did I know then that a year later I would find myself working on one of the most widely debated and contentious issues in public health.

Water Fluoridation is the controlled addition or removal of fluoride to water supply. Fluoride level of water is maintained at a level that is optimum for preserving dental health by making teeth resistant to decay. The practice of water fluoridation remains controversial even though half a century has passed since its first introduction. This is attributed to various issues such as, the possible negative health effects of fluoridation, lack of dose regulation at the individual level, if fluoride is mass medication and the ethical issues of consent or lack thereof.

Most academics seem surprised when I mention that water fluoridation is controversial. This may be because of the amount of research that already exists supporting the notion of the intervention being both efficient and safe. Water fluoridation happens to be one of the most widely researched topics in public health. Countries that artificially fluoridate water undertake systematic reviews every 5-10 years to update the evidence base. Studies conducted in areas with naturally high fluoride levels (i.e., fluoride endemic regions in parts of Asia) have linked high fluoride levels to skeletal disorders, and cancers etc. However, these studies are not relevant to artificial water fluoridation schemes as the health effects are dose dependent.

I vividly remember my first meeting with my Director of Studies Professor Vida Zohoori who had then asked me to come up with an original research idea and remarked, “A PhD is to foster independent scientific thought and not merely to work on a previously designed project”. I was a little taken aback by that as I had indeed applied for, and was selected to work on, an advertised PhD project! I ended up asking her what was left for me to research on this subject as seemingly all bases had already been covered. (I was neither completely wrong nor completely correct as I would realise in the months that followed.)

So, that day when I went home, I did what any millennial would do and Googled ‘water fluoridation’. Now before any of my readers from academia roll their eyes at this, I would like to clarify that I had already done a fair amount of background reading on water fluoridation from scientific databases and I also happen to be a dentist!

Through the looking glass

The search results were in equal parts exciting and exasperating. With each search results page I visited, my heart sank a little more. Every single idea that floated in my head was destroyed by the discovery of a research paper on the same. Then half exhausted and half asleep, I followed the millennial motto of ‘If you can’t read, why not watch it’!

I clicked on YouTube and just like Alice, fell right into a world I had never known existed! The ‘water fluoridation’ videos on YouTube were more mindboggling and engaging than any literature I had ever read (including but not limited to Game of Thrones). The videos attributed properties to water fluoridation or fluorides, which I had neither heard, read nor even imagined in my wildest dreams.

My curiosity peaked, and I kept trying to look for the scientific basis for the content in the videos. This search led me right into the thick of the controversy: the seemingly contradictory evidence, the prejudices, the sides and the politics around it. I found that it was not merely a controversy but an ongoing war where no one trusts one another and where battle lines are clearly demarcated. Pardon my use of dramatic language but this is the only way the situation can be described.

There are two major parties: those in favour of fluoridation and those against it. These groups are very heterogenous in their composition and no generalisations can be made. Both lobby for their own point of view and battle it out at every place across the world where water fluoridation as a public health measure is considered. And in this cacophony, I felt that the real opinion of the public is lost.

I then discovered that scientific studies on public opinion had been conducted in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Japan, South Korea, South Africa, Norway, Denmark and Brazil. Small fluoridation opinion studies have been conducted amongst dentists and in certain localised parts of UK as well. However, a comprehensive study examining the aspects of public perception and engagement had not yet been undertaken in the UK. I had finally found a gap and thank God for it as in the months to follow, the advertised study I had applied for had to be shelved due to ethical concerns.

Since the fluoridation debates and discussions mostly take place on the web, I felt that this the ideal platform to engage people about the issue. To examine the public’s awareness and attitude towards water fluoridation in the UK, I have designed a 10-minute web survey (with optional follow-up e-mail interviews). There is even a prize draw for 10 e-shopping vouchers worth £10 each up for grabs! So, if you are interested to know more about the research or would like to participate, please follow the links below or email me at P.Vasantavada@tees.ac.uk.

You can complete the survey here



Image: By josconklin (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Being critical of how bodies are ‘sinking’ the NHS: Lessons from the University of Wollongong (Part 2 of 3)

Guest post by Stephanie Morris, PhD Candidate at Durham University

My time at The University of Wollongong has been one of the biggest learning experiences so far on my Overseas Institutional Visit to Australia. My conversations with scholars there have led me to think more critically and question the status quo regarding physical activity, health and obesity. I had many conversations with Professor Jan Wright that made me realise the way in which physical activity is often promoted may have some unintended consequences for the health and wellbeing of those whose behaviours public health initiatives constantly seek to change.

The University of Wollongong

Many academics and practitioners stress the importance of understanding the political economy of health and health inequalities yet it appears that the media and other discourses in our neoliberal society remain focused on stigmatising individual bodies and their behaviours. I came across an article in The Spectator (a conservative magazine) recently entitled, Our NHS will sink under the weight of Britain’s fatties. The title alone got my blood curdling but one paragraph written by Dr Dawn Harper stood out in particular. It went as follows:

If you are a woman with a waist greater than 32in (80cm) or a man with a waist greater than 37in (94cm) you are at risk of type 2 diabetes. If you are a woman with a waist circumference greater than 35in (88cm) or a man with a waist greater than 40in (102cm) then your risk is very high… For your sake and for the sake of our beloved NHS, take this as a warning shot across your bow and get yourself on a healthy living plan.

Now, the first thing I thought about this extract was how fear mongering and morally loaded its tone was. The emphasis is put on the individual for being a bad citizen, immorally and self-indulgently sinking the NHS. Yet, causations and prevalence of obesity and diabetes is much more complex than a waist circumference category. The key question that I wish to raise here stems from the work of two critical scholars, Gard and Wright (2005), whose work is part of the literature critiquing the ‘obesity epidemic’, the link between body size and diseases like diabetes, and health education curriculums. They ask whether the prevalence of such obesity discourses are actually more connected with the morality included in cultural attitudes concerning fatness than about the clear communication of objective and conclusive scientific knowledge. I am not suggesting that there is no reason for some focus on body weight and size, nor am I attempting to condemn all quantitative research in this area. However, I am questioning what implications such a focus on the body might have for people, and future research and policy. First, many have argued that focusing on the individual body distracts us as researchers and citizens from looking at wider structural issues and health inequalities that need to be researched and addressed. Second, others show obesity discourses and 'Healthism' (a term coined by Crawford (1980) to describe a discourse where individuals are held morally responsible for their own health. Individuals then self-monitor and manage their health by objectifying the body.) fuel body dissatisfaction, feelings of guilt and eating disorders, thus negatively impacting on the wellbeing of children and young people.

Positive vibes from a hostel in Sydney

Due to these negative consequences on people's wellbeing I ask what we as scholars, practitioners and third sector workers in the field of public health really consider ‘health’ to be? Do we consider 'health' to be “a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity” (The WHO definition)? Or do we view ‘healthy’ as appearing as an active and slim body? There are movements away from focusing on weight and body size, including Health at Every Size (HAES) – which Peter van der Graaf also writes about in this blog post – that focuses on promoting happiness in eating and an enjoyment of movement in life. Although HAES has been critiqued by many I wonder if some of its elements can be valuable. I do not think continually worrying about one’s body or fat composition is a ‘healthy’ way to grow up or live, as I don’t think it helps achieve “physical, mental and social wellbeing”. Moreover, perhaps if we stop fixating on the body and move away from changing individual behaviours we might consider societal inequalities more and help reduce inequalities that constrain people’s daily lives. What do you think?

Obesity: How neoliberalism made us fat

Posted by Ted Schrecker, Fuse Associate Member and Clare Bambra, Fuse Associate Director

A 2010 editorial in the Journal of the American Medical Association warned: “If left unchecked, overweight and obesity have the potential to rival smoking as a public health problem, potentially reversing the net benefit that declining smoking rates have had on the US population over the last 50 years”. Obesity increases the risk of developing cardiovascular disease (CVD), certain types of cancer, Type 2 diabetes, and orthopaedic problems. At the end of the 1970s it was estimated that 15% of US adults were obese. By 2012, this had more than doubled, to 35%. Among adolescents the increase is even more striking – from 5% at the end of the 1970s to 20% in 2012. In the UK, it is estimated that obesity nearly tripled between 1980 and 2002, from 6% amongst men and 8% amongst women to 23 percent and 25 percent women respectively. Amongst children in England, obesity has increased from 11% among boys and 12% among girls in 1995 to around 20% today.

In our book Neoliberal Epidemics: How Politics Makes Us Sick we argue that obesity in high–income countries is partly the result of political and economic choices made since the 1980s. Since the early 1980s, neoliberalism or “market fundamentalism” has dominated politics and economics across much of the globe, perhaps nowhere more conspicuously than in the post-Thatcher UK. Obesity is a neoliberal epidemic – one of four, along with austerity, stress, and inequality. They are neoliberal because they are associated with or exacerbated by the rise of neoliberal politics. They are epidemics because they are on such an international scale and have been transmitted so quickly across time and space that if they were a biological contagion they would be seen as of epidemic proportions.

North American contrasts between rich and poor urban areas, less than a mile from one another
Photo: T. Schrecker

Other high-income countries have also experienced increases in obesity. Obesity has no single cause; the many influences include changes in the food environment (including advertising, marketing, accessibility and affordability); the growth of sedentary work occupations and leisure time activity, such as television viewing; changing settlement patterns, notably the rise of a privatised approach to planning organised around driving rather than walking or the provision of public transportation; and changes in the built environment that reduce the safety and attractiveness of physical activity, especially for those who do not live in leafy places. However, countries that have gone farthest down the neoliberal road, the UK and the US in particular, have experienced greater increases in obesity – suggesting that neoliberalism has magnified and accelerated trends that are present to some extent throughout the high-income world.

Obesity is a neoliberal epidemic for several reasons. These include: (1) economic and social policies that have meant fewer people can afford a healthy and balanced diet; (2) increasing time poverty, as when the demands of work (often on unpredictable schedules), transportation, and (especially for women) child care within ‘flexible’ labour markets are combined, there is not much time or energy left for eating a healthy diet and the attraction of a quick stop at the shopping park’s fast food outlet are strong; (3) the role of aggressive corporate marketing of unhealthy, energy-dense foods, notably as multi-national supermarkets, manufacturers of ultra-processed food and fast food chains expand into developing economies with the lowering of barriers to foreign investment. This helps to explain why overweight and obesity are now also rising rapidly in many middle- and some low-income countries, with prevalence in Mexican adults comparable to levels in the United States.

Corporate food systems and time poverty interact at the shopping park.
Photo: T. Schrecker

A fourth connection was addressed at a groundbreaking workshop at the University of Oxford in 2009: political structures such as welfare state regimes. More specifically, higher levels of economic insecurity – associated with neoliberal policies like the rollback of welfare state protections and opening up labour markets to the “creative destruction” that Joseph Schumpeter extolled as a defining virtue of capitalism – are causally linked with a higher prevalence of obesity through both biological (stress-related) and psychosocial (comfort eating) mechanisms, in addition to the more direct effects on time and food budgets.

Public health researchers, who agree on little else, recognize that reducing overweight and obesity is a formidable challenge. A first step is to avoid the lifestyle trap. A recent literature review on policy interventions to tackle what has been called the obesogenic environment produced by the Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy provides some useful directions. Its authors do not shrink from arguing the need for large-scale interventions that may be expensive or challenging to vested interests, noting (for example) that the transport mode split in urban areas is 84% by car versus 9 percent walking in the United States, while it’s 36% by car versus 39% walking in Sweden. “Suffice it to say, it has been a concerted combination of infrastructure provision, integrated transport planning and disincentives for private cars which has helped to bring about the higher active travel rates.” We have no easy solutions, but emphasise that neoliberalism and the associated political choices have exacerbated the obesity crisis. Obesity is an example of how politics makes us sick.

Links: Schrecker, T. and Bambra, C. (2015) Neoliberal Epidemics: How Politics Makes Us Sick, Palgrave Macmillan, available at: http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/how-politics-makes-us-sick-ted-schrecker/?K=9781137463098

Professors Schrecker and Bambra will be discussing their new book 'How Politics Makes Us Sick' at an event at Durham University on 15 October 2015. For more details click here.

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About the authors

In June 2013, Ted Schrecker moved from Canada to take up a position as Professor of Global Health Policy, Centre for Public Policy and Health, Durham University (UK). Since 2002, most of his research has focused on the implications of globalization for health; he also has long-standing interest in issues at the interface of science, ethics, law and public policy. A political scientist by background, Ted worked as a legislative researcher and consultant for many years before coming to the academic world, and co-edits the Journal of Public Health. Among his publications, he is editor of the Ashgate Research Companion to the Globalization of Health (2012) and co-editor of a four-volume collection of key sources in Global Health for the Sage Library of Health and Social Welfare (2011). Ted is also an Associate Member of Fuse. Ted can be followed on Twitter @ProfGlobHealth.

As well as being an Associate Director of Fuse, Clare Bambra PhD is Professor of Public Health Geography and Director of the Centre for Health and Inequalities Research, Durham University (UK). Her research focuses on the health effects of labour markets, health and welfare systems, as well as the role of public policies to reduce health inequalities. She has published extensively in the field of health inequalities including a book on Work, Worklessness and the Political Economy of Health (Oxford University Press, 2011). She contributed to the Marmot Reviews of Health Inequalities in England (2010) and Europe (2013); the US National Research Council Report on US Health in International Perspective (2013); a UK Parliamentary Labour Party Inquiry into international health systems (2013), as well as the Public Health England commissioned report on the health equity in the North of England: Due North (2014). She is a member of the British Labour Party and can be followed on Twitter @ProfBambra.

Shielding against the impact of the dementia time bomb

Guest post by Mark Parkinson, Postgraduate Researcher, Department of Public Health & Wellbeing, Northumbria University

Today (September 21) marks the anniversary of World Alzheimer’s Day which aims to raise public awareness about this most common form of dementia.

Dementia represents one of the main causes of disability in later life. Current estimates indicate that someone is diagnosed with the disease every 68 seconds. Alzheimer’s affects 44 million people globally with this figure predicted to triple over the next 35 years - a phenomenon aptly named 'The Dementia Time Bomb'. Advances in health mean many more people are surviving life-threatening diseases such as cancer, but susceptible to life limiting diseases such as dementia.

By 2030 more than 20 million people in the UK will be aged 60 or over. For people familiar with dementia it is one of the diseases most feared as they approach 60 years of age, a fear justified given the increased prevalence of the disease once we reach this milestone, a fear heightened by the fact that it is irreversible and terminal.

The impact of all this truly hit home during a recent conversation with my mother. Renowned for her ability to trounce all-comers at Scrabble, she struggled to recall the word ‘padlock’ prompting her to quip, with mock seriousness, that perhaps she was succumbing to the disease. My mother’s perception of Alzheimer’s still follows a traditional and mistaken one that Alzheimer’s disease is a typical and therefore ‘normal’ part of ageing. She is not alone: it is estimated that around 60% of people worldwide also incorrectly believe this, while 40% of people mistakenly think it is not fatal. I on the other hand stopped dead in my tracks. The sudden realisation that my mother’s uncharacteristic memory block might genuinely be a precursor to the more serious cerebral ‘padlocks’ associated with dementia. As a researcher involved in dementia I was only too well aware that Stage 2 of the disease is generally represented by very mild cognitive decline, including deficits to semantic memory that can include a sudden inability to recall everyday words. Much worse though was my knowledge that the later stage of Alzheimer’s can be marked by far more severe symptoms as part of a terminal degenerative process that can endure for 15 long years. A key question ran through my mind at this point: who would care for my mother if she did develop dementia?

In the vast majority of cases it is a family member who will elect to take on this role. One in eight of the UK adult population already provides such an unpaid but invaluable service. However, a central problem with our continued reliance on unpaid care is that, in general, family carers of people with dementia experience greater health inequalities due to the chronic stress commonly associated with long-term caregiving. This threatens carers' health whilst also undermining their ability to continue to provide care. A key question therefore is, ‘who will care for the carers?’ This question was the springboard for the research project I am presently engaged in which seeks to investigate, ‘What works to support family carers of people with dementia?’ While myriad resources exist that might potentially be made available, what is noticeably absent is any agreed ‘gold standard’ of support that might be put into place, tailored according to the different stages of Alzheimer’s. Unlocking this particular dementia challenge will not prevent the ‘time bomb,’ but it can offer families a much needed protective shield if and when that time does come. The need to raise awareness of dementia and the challenges associated with it has never been more urgent - the disease lies on all our doorsteps. 

Mark is currently engaged in a project concerned with several key questions related to Alzheimer’s disease: (i) which factors remain crucial to resilience-building for family carers of people with dementia (PWD) in order to maintain and sustain informal caregiving and which hinder it (ii) how can tailored support best be targeted to address the needs of specific carers? (iii) how can the inherent health inequalities faced by family carers of PWD be reduced? 

UK Dementia Awareness Week 2015 took place 17-23 May. If you wish to find out more about Alzheimer's please visit the Alzheimer's Society website.

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