Case study: Research on cold homes and health, and the use of pen portraits as an actionable tool for research implementation in local authority settings NIHR CLAHRC YH Theme: Public Health and Inequalities

March 2015

Contact: [email protected] Background: The Warm Well Families (WWF) and cold homes related research projects (including Keeping Warm in Later Life projecT KWILLT) have been developed through the Public Health and Health Inequalities theme. The projects were initiated in CLAHRC SY. KWILLT was undertaken in Rotherham and has already been submitted by CLAHRC SY as an added value case study in 2012. Subsequently it has been recognised by the Council of Deans as an exemplar of good practice for impact ( see http://www.councilofdeans.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Care-Transformedweb-version-1.pdf) and KWILLT findings have been identified in the National Cold Weather Plan for England https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/365756/CWP_2014.p df . The Warm Well families project builds on the methodologies developed in KWILLT, and was undertaken in partnership with Doncaster MBC, Rotherham MBC, Consumer Futures Energy and Sheffield Hallam University. It uses social marketing techniques to create a segmentation model and pen portraits have been used to translate insight of heating practices and heating choices for front line practitioners, commissioners and policy makers and elected members. WWF explored the attitudes, values and behaviours of families living in cold homes and health, social care, local authority and voluntary sector staff who support families. The research findings have been used to influence priority setting policy in local authorities and national policy. Outputs and impact: 1. In order to bring the research to life four pen portraits have been developed. These are not real stories or people however, they are built using the research findings and real life observations. These are portraits of possible family scenarios using a descriptive narrative and they are designed to be used to inform the development of targeted and effective interventions. They are therefore ‘actionable tools’. The four pen portraits are: seeing the issues and overcoming the barriers; Constantly juggling: Just living from day to day; living on the edge of crisis. http://www.shu.ac.uk/research/hsc/ourexpertise/warm-well-families The pen portraits have been used for staff training in Local Authorities as a tool to share ‘stories’ of families that are risk of cold related ill health, raising awareness of the trade-off’s people face to keep warm.

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2.

WWF resource launch event: Over 30 representatives from local authority, health, academic, Voluntary Community Services organisations across Y&H attended a launch event of the research resources in February 2015.

3. Book of Damp: Chap book - Early method of disseminating information using small printed books, with limited words and mainly images. The Book of Damp is used as an alternative method of highlighting findings from the WWF research. http://www.shu.ac.uk/research/hsc/sites/shu.ac.uk/files/The%20Book%20of%20Damp.pdf 4. WWF final reports: http://www.shu.ac.uk/research/hsc/ourexpertise/warm-well-families 5. Doncaster and Rotherham safeguarding children workshops and stakeholder events. Doncaster antipoverty summit. Presentations of pen portraits and segmentation model. 6. Keeping warm with sickle cell research funded by the Chessire Lehman Trust. 7. Conference presentations at: Joint Social Work Education and Research Conference XXth IPSCAN International Congress Conference, BSA Medical Sociology Group Annual conference 2014 Conference 8. Response to the NICE guidance https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng6

consultation

on

Excess

Winter

Mortality

Next steps: As evidenced in the outputs section above the research has led to the following outputs and resources: 1. WWF and KWILLT pen portraits and segmentation model. We are aiming to put these resources on the winterwarmthengland website to increase visibility of this resource target audiences, which will also enable us to track downloads 2. Book of Damp: will be used to increase warmth behaviours to the general public 3. Trade off model –to be used in training and Continual Professional Development for social work, nursing and allied health professionals in Sheffield Hallam University 4. Incorporation of pen portraits in to Local Authority fuel poverty strategies in Doncaster and Rotherham

How CLAHRC supports this project: NIHR CLAHRC funds 0.5FTE researcher who is key to the development of the research and dissemination of the research findings. The resource has also facilitated links with local authorities across Y&H to engage with collaborative work and protocol development for additional research studies.

Provided for i.e NIHR Annual Progress Report March 2015 The NIHR CLAHRC Yorkshire and Humber is a partnership between 31 organisations including NHS, Higher Education, Local Authorities, Charities, Industry and the Regional Innovation Hub. A full list is available on our website www.clahrcyh.nihr.ac.uk

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