Study Spotlight

What is the Study Spotlight?

On this page, you can scroll down to find examples of studies related to domiciliary/home care.

Some of the studies may still be open, and you can register your interest in finding out about how you can get involved with these, or similar studies by completing the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form. Other studies may have finished but you can read more about their findings below.

Research plays an important part in ensuring the health and care sector continues to offer innovative evidence based support for the nation and we can all play a part. Have a read of the study information below and if you'd like to hear more about the opportunities available, register your derails on the form.

Active studies

Study: LEAP - LGBTQ+ Inclusive Home Care Provision for Older People

What is the purpose of this study?

The LEAP study explores how prepared the home care workforce is to support older LGBTQ+ people (by prepared we mean if they have the skills, knowledge confidence to support older LGBTQ+ people.)

We know from other care settings (care homes, extra care housing) that many older LGBTQ+ people experience discrimination and many care staff feel don’t feel confident around LGBTQ+ inclusion. We know little about the situation in home care, and this knowledge is needed to adequately support the workforce to be inclusive.

How will this study be carried out?

The team are looking for 450 responses between November '25 to April '26. Data will be collected via:

an online survey for the home care workforce
online interviews with the home care workforce
(online) interviews with older LGBTQ+ people

About the survey

It's is for anyone working in home care in England or Wales (frontline or management). It will include some general questions about for example age, gender, job role.

There will be specific questions around LGBTQ+ inclusion, for example, training (needs), knowledge, attitudes, experience.

They survey is anonymous and will take betwene 10-15 minutes.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: Awareness Matters in Dementia

What is the purpose of this study?

It aims to identify solutions for managing differences in awareness - how people with dementia view their abilities and everyday difficulties. This may include: support for people with dementia, education and resources for carers as well as training for healthcare professionals on effective communication and support strategies

Who can take part?

People who care for someone with dementia, who lives at home:

Family members/friends with a caring role
Professional carers
Healthcare professionals

What is involved?

Taking part is done via an anonymous survey and you'll be asked to:

Share experiences with 'awareness' related challenges in dementia care
Provide insights in strategies that may help manage these challenges

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: ‘HOPES’ for Homecare: Developing Reflective Learning for Home Care Workers Supporting People with Dementia

What is the purpose of this study?

Most people with dementia desire to remain at home, however support from homecare providers is not always easy to accept. Home care workers have limited training and support surrounding dementia care.

This can mean care is often not best practice and the Alzheimers Society is calling for mandatory dementia care training to be delivered to all social care staff.

This project proposes to co-design a training resource for home care workers supporting people with dementia, who struggle to accept care.
This will be an adaptation of the HOPES’ resource for specialist support workers.

How will this study be conducted?

Stage 1: Understand and Define - a systematic review, interviews and focus groups.

Stage 2: Ideate - co-design workshops and prototyping

Stage 3: Test - feedback and refining.

Focus Groups

Exploring what constitutes good training, how training is implemented in home care and what the challenges might be from the perspectives of homecare mangers, trainers, academics and intervention developers.

Interviews

How do family carers and people with dementia view home care?
What are home care workers’ experiences of delivering home care to people with dementia?
What training needs are perceived?

Co-production Workshops

World Café workshops with homecare staff, trainers, managers and family caregivers. The themes are below:

Content
Format
Delivery

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: DomCare: The Benefits and Costs of Domiciliary Care

What is the purpose of this study?

To fill important gap in evidence on peoples’ experience of homecare and the value of homecare in improving their lives and to investigate which type of care improves people’s lives the most for the same cost.

For this we will:

Compare care home with housing with care and domiciliary care services,

Compare how care provided by agencies compares with that of Personal Assistants (PAs) and
Assess the effects domiciliary care has on unpaid carers’ wellbeing and the health and outcomes of those being cared for.

How will the study be conducted?

complete a short survey (Sep-Oct 2025);
distribute survey packs to the people you support (Feb 2026).

No financial cost to you: survey packs in pre-stamped envelopes; financial compensation for staff time; support form NIHR RRDN if lacking staff time.

The benefits are a positive contribution towards CQC quality rating; and benchmarking briefs showing the quality of life of your clients as compared to similar care locations.

Confidentiality: you and your clients will not be identifiable in any publications, and we are not sharing your data; full GDPR compliance.

Who are the study team looking for?

Specifically homecare providers or housing with care schemes supporting adults in Kent, Surrey or Sussex, East Midlands or Yorkshire & Humber.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: Understanding the scale, impact and care trajectory for patients who have a long lie after a fall

Study Aims:

Current guidance for treatment of patients with a long lie is inconsistent and little is known about the characteristics of patients who have a long lie, the social, health and economic impact of these long lies and whether any potential interventions may mitigate the impact of a long lie.

The research aims to improve understanding about which patients fall and have a long lie, what care they require after a long lie, the impacts of a long lie (health, psychological and economic) and to understand what interventions may help people during and after a long lie.

Study Methods:

This part of the research uses an interview of all UK NHS 999 Emergency Operations Centre ambulance service clinical leads (n=13) and an interview of residential/ nursing home managers in the Yorkshire area to understand the interventions, policies, guidance and local initiatives that are used to care for people during a long lie.

The interview would take approximately 30-40 minutes and can be scheduled at a time convenient for you, including during the daytime or evening. It can be done via telephone or online (Google Meet/ MS Teams). To thank you for your time, you will receive a £25 high-street shopping voucher upon completion of the interview and be offered a CPD certificate.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: Complex Homecare in MND (CHiMND)

Are you a homecare worker for someone with Motor Neurone Disease (MND) who uses equipment such as a PEG feeding tube, ventilator or communication device? or,
Have you supported someone with MND to use this equipment at home in the past? or,
Do you manage homecare services for people with MND who use this equipment at home?

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

CHiMND Study Aims:

This study aims to explore the roles and relationships of homecare workers who support people living with MND with complex care needs at home.

With advances in health technologies, more people with MND can now live at home supported by equipment such as ventilators and feeding tubes. This increases the demands on family carers and often requires extra support from paid homecare workers.

Homecare workers play a crucial role in helping families deliver complex care at home. However, we know little about how homecare workers carry out their responsibilities, the skills required, and how they work together with family carers and other healthcare professionals.

CHiMND Study Methods:

This study will collect data across three workstreams:

1: One-off interviews with homecare workers with current or previous experience of supporting a person with MND with complex care needs and key stakeholders involved in commissioning, co-ordinating and managing care packages.

2: Homecare workers who currently support a person with MND with complex care needs will be invited to contribute to a simple online diary over approximately two to eight weeks.

3: Secondary analysis of interview data from two previous studies involving people living with MND receiving complex interventions and family carers (approximately 50 people in total).

What will the CHiMND study achieve?

The findings from this study will increase our understanding of the challenges and rewards of delivering complex homecare and the support needs of homecare workers. This information may contribute to improving the recruitment, training, and retention of homecare workers.

Findings will also provide insight into how communication and coordination of care among different professionals and services can be improved. Ultimately, better understanding of the roles and responsibilities of homecare workers could lead to higher quality care at home for people living with MND, prevent unnecessary hospital admissions, and increase support for family carers.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: Exploring barriers and facilitators to setting up a longitudinal

social care database for older adult services

What is the purpose of this study?

The purpose of this study is to explore the barriers and facilitators to setting up a longitudinal database to capture the use of community-based social care services for older adults in England for research purposes.

Capturing data on the use of services for older adults, such as day care, respite care and home care, is important to help support quality improvement and research looking to further understand the impact of accessing social care.

However, collecting data on the use of services is challenging as services are delivered by different organisations, across sectors. Our study is looking to explore how a longitudinal database could be set up to help with research activity.

What will happen if I take part?

The study involves taking part in a remote one-to-one interview which lasts no longer than 45 minutes.

The interview will cover questions about possible barriers and facilitators to setting up a longitudinal database capturing the use of community-based social care services for older adults, and how possible challenges could be overcome. We are interested in exploring your thoughts and experiences on how this database could be set up.

The remote interview will be conducted over MS Teams with a research team member (Dr Thais Caprioli or Susan Davies). The date and time of the interview will be scheduled depending on your preferences and availability.

During the interview, you can choose whether to enable the video icon, and the researchers will only enable their video icon if you choose to enable yours. All data obtained will be anonymised and remain confidential.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in this study, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Closed studies

Study: Dem Champ - Dementia Champions in Homecare Study

This was a study running from 2022-24 with the overall aim to define, refine and evolve the role of Dementia Champions (DC) in the homecare sector, including:

Conceptualising what a ‘Dementia Champion’ is and how the role is implemented in practice across health and social care settings
Identifying what components of the DC role already exist in homecare
Co-producing a model of the DC role within the homecare sector
Understanding how the DC role might be implemented in the homecare sector, and
Understanding the strengths and limitations of the DC role in the homecare sector

How was the Dem Champ study carried out?

67 practitioners and 11 people with lived experience took part in the study, with interviews, document reviews, co-production workshops and job description analysis all forming part of the methodology.

You can information about the findings of the study, as well as implications for the future by visiting the Dem Champ study site and as well as watching the animated video.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in studies like this, or about other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: nuTritiOn and deMentia AT hOme (TOMATO project)

This was a feasibility study of an intervention to provide nutritional care for people living with dementia at home
Working together with home care workers, people with dementia, and family carers to improve nutritional care for people living with dementia at home. The study collaborated with home care organisations across different regions of England.
The project was led by Bournemouth University working in collaboration with the Homecare Association, Leeds Beckett University and Universities of Leeds and Exeter and Leeds Community Healthcare NHS Trust.

How was the TOMATO study carried out?

Phase 1 involved adapting the existing nutrition intervention based on feedback from people living with dementia, family carers, and home care workers.

Alongside a nutritional awareness training for home care staff, the Eating and Drinking Well with Dementia at Home guides, designed for family carers, friends, and home care professionals, have now been created.

These resources explain the importance of good nutrition and provide staff and family carers/friends with practical tips and ‘how-to’ ideas to try out based on person-centred needs.

Phase 2 focused on training home care workers to deliver the adapted nutrition intervention to people living with dementia receiving care at home, in collaboration with family carers and friends. Outcome measures were gathered at baseline and four months.

Sharing Our Findings

The TOMATO project offers new evidence-based resources to improve dementia care in home care context.

With the project now completed, the findings will be widely disseminated through blogs, social media, academic and professional publications, professional networks, conferences, and partnerships with social care stakeholders. Keep up with us on the TOMATO webpage.

Next Steps

Coming Soon: TOMATO Launch Event – Summer 2025!

The Eating and Drinking Well with Dementia at Home guides will be available during the event. To learn more and receive event details closer to the time, complete the BU form.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form

Study: Investigating variation in pay in adult social care

What was the purpose of this study?

This study explored variations in pay for adult social care workers, who deliver care to vulnerable people in their own homes, residential and nursing care homes, or supported accommodation in England.

It explored how:

pay is affected by local conditions, such as deprivation, and local authority processes for buying care
pay variations affect workers, for example, leaving their jobs or developing skills

How was the study conducted?

This research had three parts:

Using statistics provided by Skills for Care to investigate the factors affecting pay variations, including local authorities’ fee levels and contracting practices, as well as the effect of pay on workers’ outcomes such as skills and retention. Led by Dr Akbar Ullah of the University of Manchester, a member of the organising care theme of the Applied Research Collaboration Greater Manchester (ARC-GM).
A survey of organisations that provide adult social care, which explored their pay practices and identified good practice. It was led by Professor Carol Woodhams of the University of Surrey.
Involved interviews with managers of care organisations and with care workers to explore their views on pay variations and the consequences for care workers, care recipients and their families. It was led by Dr Gail Hebson from Manchester Met.

What were the findings?

As a result of the study, three reports into the variation in pay in adult social care have been produced including a policy report, a policy briefing and a full NIHR research report, as well as a video summarising the study into pay variance in adult social care.

If you would like to find out more information about how to get involved in other research opportunities for Home Care providers, please register your details via the Home Care Portal Expression of Interest form