ALTER: Age UK LaTER Life Research v 1.0
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Understanding the experience of providing and receiving the Age UK Later Life Service. A multiple qualitative case study.
IRAS ID
237984
Contact name
Catherine Walshe
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Lancaster University
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 4 months, 30 days
Research summary
BACKGROUND: Older people approaching the end of their lives do not always experience the best possible quality of life or wellbeing. A novel service, provided by Age UK in collaboration with primary care providers, aims to improve wellbeing. The service facilitates personalised conversations, goal setting, and advance care planning. It is not known how people may experience this service, or what its impact may be.
AIM:To understand how and why the Age UK Later Life services influence the end of life experiences of older people.
DESIGN: Multiple qualitative case studies.
SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: The setting will be three Age UK Later Life Service sites across England. Participants will include a) Older people (aged 50+) receiving the Age UK Later Life service, together with their family/informal carers, and b) stake holders including general practitioners, community nurses, social care workers and commissioners.
DATA COLLECTION: Data collection in each site will take place over approximately 5 months. Individual, serial interviews (up to 2) with older people (n≤10 per case study site) and family/informal carers (n ≤ 5 per case study site). Focus group interviews with health and social care professionals (n≤10 participants per case study site). Observation of relevant meetings, and collection of contextual data and documents. A final deliberative panel will be held to discuss emerging findings.
DATA ANALYSIS: Framework Analysis will facilitate analysis between cases using a matrix approach. Analysis follows five key stages: familiarisation, identifying a thematic framework, indexing, charting, and mapping and interpretation. Cross case pattern matching will follow to identify thematic factors. All qualitative analyses will be managed using NVivo™ software.
Findings should both inform the development of future Age UK services, but also be generalizable to improve the wellbeing of older people towards the end of life.
FUNDING: Funded by Age UK.
REC name
North West - Liverpool Central Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/NW/0705
Date of REC Opinion
2 Feb 2018
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion