Building social care research capacity
We supported social care research capacity development in south London across the career pathway, from early-career to research leaders.
We also actively supported social care practitioners’ involvement in research through the Social Care Research Capacity Building Programme (SHARE). Eleven awardees were recruited. Nine completed a 60-credit, master’s-level research skills and methods module at Kingston University. Awardees undertook projects within their own workplaces as well as attending conferences and other networking events. Awardees were also linked with a mentor at the HSCWRU. One awardee is applying for an NIHR career development award, another an NIHR Pre-Doctoral Fellowship. One awardee has secured 100k from stakeholders to run a pilot supporting people with hoarding behaviours, with plans to evaluate outcomes – and possibly develop a doctoral proposal. An event was held on 20th March 2026 when awardees presented their work to family, friends, colleagues and mentors.
We co-created community networks which aim to widen involvement in research by under-represented people living in south London, implemented innovative methods, supported the workforce to work with people living with dementia and supported social care researchers and our own team who gained funding for further research.
NIHR Dementia Research Programme (Dem-Comm)
Two of our team members were dementia post-doctoral fellows as part of the NIHR Dem-Comm programme, building research capacity in palliative and social care for people living with dementia through two interventions. Read more about this work and our other dementia work.
Dementia Community Research Network (DCRN)
We co-lead the DCRN, which is a network of community organisations, public members, and dementia researchers. We aim to improve care for all people affected by dementia by giving opportunities for people of all backgrounds and ethnicities to be involved in research. This involves promoting knowledge exchange and collaboration among DCRN members through annual community conferences and monthly meetings. Our focus is on increasing inclusion in dementia research, evidenced by our recent co-produced guide that will help researchers facilitate wider inclusion in dementia research. Read more about the DCRN.
Dementia Lens: Raising Awareness Through Immersive Learning
Dr Luijnenburg and colleagues are developing a Virtual Reality (VR) tool for retail workers to demonstrate the challenges people living with dementia might face when going to a supermarket. The VR tool will aid in raising better awareness of a dementia, inform users on how to support people living with dementia in a retail environment, and be a step toward a more dementia friendly community.
Spirituality in residential care for people living with dementia: implementing reflective tools for care home workers of people living with dementia (SpiritDem)
Dr Luijnenburg developed guidance and policy recommendations to support care homes in better meeting residents’ spiritual needs, particularly those living with dementia. She co-developed the SPIRIT in Care guide with care home staff, residents living with dementia, and their family and friends to increase understanding of the spiritual needs of residents living with dementia in care homes and support the care home workforce to include spirituality in day-to-day care practice. Manjot Brar supported this work. Read more about this work.
Improving care for people living and dying with dementia
Dr Williamson is leading and supporting multiple studies that focus on improving care for people living and dying with dementia, including the two-year project, PALLDEM-Homecare. Lesley jointly coordinates the Dementia Community Research Network and is a co-applicant of the EMPOWER Dementia Network Plus and is part of the Impact Centre in Palliative and End-of-Life Care.
Review of Occupational Health and well-being service provision for the South London Local Authorities’ employees (OHLA)
We explored well-being and occupational health service arrangements available to the employees of South London Local Authorities. Read more here.
Academic teaching
Our team co-leads the Service Development and Delivery module on the MSc Health and Social Care Policy offered by The Policy Institute to staff of the Department of Health and Social Care. Team members also co-lead and teach on the Service Development and Policy modules of the Palliative Care MSc and new online Health and Care Strategies for Ageing Populations MSc. Team members have also jointly convened a Master’s level qualitative research methods module; ad hoc lectured about qualitative and mixed methods research methods on Master’s programmes; and guest-edited a BMC Geriatrics Collection on 'Living at home with Dementia'.
A practical guide to designing and conducting implementation research in social care
The SC-ImpRes (Social Care Implementation Research) guide was created by researchers at ARC South London. It provides a step-by-step approach to designing and conducting implementation research in social care. Implementation research explores, describes, explains and/or predicts implementation. Its objective is to improve the adoption (take-up) of effective practices, with appropriate adaptation and modification if necessary.
The guide contains eight sections, each of which introduces key terms and concepts relevant to implementation research in social care and includes reflective questions and statements to consider when designing and conducting implementation research.
The guide aims to:
- Support social care researchers and practitioners to design and conduct research about implementation (rather than to do implementation) of social care programmes and interventions.
- Define commonly used implementation science terminology.
- Provide an overview of common practices and underlying concepts of implementation science that are relevant to the social care field.
- Signpost research teams to relevant literature and resources to support the design of implementation research in social care.
Who is this guide for?
- Social care researchers and practitioners designing and conducting implementation research (but not primarily performing implementation of a programme or intervention in practice).
- Social care researchers and practitioners with varying levels of expertise in implementation science (including beginner, intermediate and advanced levels).
Background
Social Care ImpRes belongs to the wider ImpRes family of resources (including the Implementation Science Research development (ImpRes) tool and guide (Hull et al., 2019), the Implementation Research Proposal Assessment Criteria (ImpResPAC) tool (Sweetnam et al., 2022) and the Implementation Science Research Glossary. Its development was informed by the original ImpRes tool and guide and by an Expert Advisory Group, consisting of 13 social care and implementation science experts.
View the SC-ImpRes interactive PDF.