Experience of accessing mainstream inpatient mental health hospital
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Experiences and perspectives of adults with learning disabilities, carers, and staff on care provision and the implementation of national policy in mainstream acute mental health inpatient services.
IRAS ID
365600
Contact name
Esme Hession
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Royal Holloway, University of London
Duration of Study in the UK
2 years, 4 months, 1 days
Research summary
Research has found that people with learning disabilities experience high rates of poor mental health and are disproportionately supported within inpatient mental health services. For many individuals this will be in a mainstream mental health ward, opposed to a specialist learning disability ward. In the UK multiple new policies have been implemented to improve the care for people with learning disabilities when they are supported in mainstream inpatient mental health hospitals. Despite the introduction of these policies, research has generally painted a negative picture of the care received and staff in these settings still lack confidence supporting this population. Recent studies display staff concerns that policy delivery and application may fall short of person-centred care. Furthermore, research has rarely focused on the specific lived experience of people with learning disabilities, and their carers, of accessing mainstream inpatient mental health services, or the experience of staff. As such, this will be focus of the research project.
The research will be comprised of two parts. The first part aims to explore the experience of people with learning disabilities, and their carers, of accessing mainstream inpatient mental health wards within the last five years through conducting semi-structured interviews. The interviews will be analysed using Interpretive Phenomenon Analysis (IPA) to develop and interpret themes in relation to the research question. The second part of the project aims to obtain an in-depth understanding of staff experiences implementing recent policy, the facilitators and barriers, specifically in mainstream inpatient mental health settings. To do this, semi-structured interviews will also be used but the data will be analysed with thematic analysis. Experts by experience will be involved throughout to inform the research design, analysis of data and dissemination of the findings. The findings will be disseminated through a report and presentations to relevant stakeholders.
REC name
London - Queen Square Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
26/LO/0306
Date of REC Opinion
28 May 2026
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion