Research objectives
Identify new roles introduced to secondary mental health services (Phase 1)
Generate national overview of new roles implemented, using adapted typology of skill-mix change (Phase 2)
Identify the cultural, service and professional contexts in which roles are implemented and how these affect the wider functioning of the service (Phase 2)
Identify and describe the boundary work that occurs in practice as a result of the introduction of new roles into the mental healthcare workforce (Phase 3)
Examine the effects of the new roles on (i) service users, (ii) professionals in new roles and (iii) professionals in existing roles bordering the new roles (Phase 3)
Use the findings to produce both generic and role-/context-specific guidance on how to effectively implement new professional roles in NHS mental healthcare services (Phase 4)
What will we learn from this research?
The new knowledge generated by this study will provide guidance to facilitate more effective skill-mix change in mental health and in other healthcare settings, to the benefit of service users and both new and existing staff. The study findings will also help refine models of skill-mix change and generate rich evidence on forms of “boundary work”, helping us to understand how professionals interact when they work together across boundaries between different spheres of activity, and the conditions which lead to more constructive or indeed more destructive forms of behaviour.
We asked key stakeholders of our research why this research is critical in helping NHS services to respond to the ongoing workforce crisis in mental health and some of the key issues they hope the research will help address. Watch these short videos to find out more.
How will we share our findings?
Findings will be disseminated through varied activities to share findings with public/patients, plus focused briefing documents and interactive workshops to explain skill-mix change in practice and offer structured guidance to multiple stakeholders leading or affected by workforce transformation in mental health services and across the NHS.