HIDDEN applied ethnography study

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  Mental Health In everyDay family lives and routine Deep ENd care (HIDDEN)

• IRAS ID

  349828

• Contact name

  Domna Salonen

• Contact email

  d.salonen2@newcastle.ac.uk

• Sponsor organisation

  Newcastle University

• Duration of Study in the UK

  1 years, 1 months, 22 days

• Research summary

  More and more people in the UK live with multiple long-term mental health conditions (MH-MLTCs). These can be a combination of one or more mental health conditions, a mental health condition with physical and neurological conditions, or one condition that has profound impacts’ on the person’s day-to-day functioning and wellbeing, such as a severe mental illness or a learning disability. In families, one family members’ health challenges impact on everyone’s daily lives.

  Healthcare services have not been planned with MH-MLTCs in mind. Clinical guidelines and most service models focus on treating one condition at a time. It is not routine practice everywhere to consider all family members’ coping and wellbeing.

  Health services need to find ways to help patients and families when they try to live their best lives with MH-MLTCs. Support should be offered as early as possible and as near the families’ everyday lives as possible. General practices and services in their area (community-based services) are potential places for offering this type of proactive and meaningful care. To develop new and better ways to provide care, it needs to be understood what goes on in routine care and in the lives of families with MH-MLTCs.

  This research aims at understanding how mental health and wellbeing can be maintained and improved in families with MH-MLTCs, and how community-based services can help.
  
  This study aims at:
  • Understanding mental health stressors and protective factors in the everyday lives of families with MH-MLTCs
  • Identifying how primary care services can offer support that is meaningful to families with MH-MLTCs

• REC name

  South Central - Berkshire Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  25/SC/0321

• Date of REC Opinion

  4 Dec 2025

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion