The Centre for Mental Health Nursing Research is running a varied programme of high-quality research with the aim of improving the delivery and experience of mental healthcare and mental health nursing across a range of service settings. 

Our research centre is led by Professor Alan Simpson, and staff work across the Department of Health Service & Population Research at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, the Care in Long-Term Conditions Research Division in the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care, and South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.

Our research is collaboratively developed and conducted in partnership with service users, carers, clinicians, service managers and policy makers, and across researcher disciplines. We are building on a body of previous research that has included studies in inpatient and community mental healthcare and other settings and in the transitions between them.

We are multidisciplinary, including researchers in mental health, adult, child and learning disabilities nursing, psychology, and arts and creative therapies, with an international reputation for high levels of effective involvement and co-production with diverse lived experience researchers.

We conduct applied mental health research across a range of NHS and other clinical settings including adult and children/young people’s acute inpatient and community mental health services, eating disorder services, emergency departments, acute hospitals, and in the voluntary sector.

Research themes

Our research includes a wide range of topics including inpatient care, surveillance and digital technologies in mental healthcare, risk and safety planning, physical healthcare for people with mental illness, care-planning, advance choice documents and care coordination, recovery, peer support, trauma-informed and relational care, and studies focused on specific mental health conditions or experiences such as eating disorders, trauma and PTSD.

Current research themes and leads within the group are outlined below. Click here for a pdf detailing the research themes and how they connect.

• Safewards Research (Professor Alan Simpson & Geoff Brennan)
• Inpatient Mental Health Care Research (Professor Alan Simpson, Geoff Brennan, Dr Una Foye, Dr Jess Griffiths)
• Community Mental Health Care Research (Professor Alan Simpson & Dr Una Foye)
• The Intersection between Physical and Mental Health (Professor Alan Simpson & Dr Vasiliki Tzouvara)
• Trauma Research (Dr Vasiliki Tzouvara)
• Eating Disorders Research (Dr Tom Jewell & Dr Una Foye)
• Mental Health Recovery Research (Dr Mary Leamy & Professor Alan Simpson)
• Children and Young Persons Mental Health Research (Dr Tom Jewell & Dr Zoe Moula)
• Methodologies & Evidence-based Practice for Nursing
• Lived Experience of Mental Health Involvement, Co-Production & Co-Design
• Creative and Alternative Approaches to Mental Health Care and Research (Dr Zoe Moula)

Ongoing studies we are involved with include:

• The use of surveillance technologies on inpatient mental health wards and exploring attitudes to conflict and containment measures across mental healthcare settings
• The role of activities for inpatient acute wards to support health, recovery and mental wellbeing
• Implementing and evaluating Safewards across a range of mental health settings
• The ASSURED trial to improve the care of people in emergency departments who have self-harmed and/or are suicidal
• Mental health recovery/evaluations of interventions to support recovery-oriented practice, including peer support.
• Developing interventions to improve experiences of trauma-informed care for patients and staff

We also host, supervise and support multi-disciplinary PhD, MRes and MSc students and pre-registration nursing students undertaking research.

The NIHR Policy Research Unit in Mental Health (MHPRU) is also linked to the team through Co-Director, Professor Alan Simpson. The MHPRU consists of a team of researchers at King's, University College London, and the universities of York and Oxford who work with collaborators to conduct rapid research to inform mental health policy at DHSC, NHS England and other government and arms-length bodies, with the aim of helping policymakers make timely nationwide plans for mental health services based on expert views and evidence.

Centre for Mental Health Nursing Research meetings

Held on the afternoon of the first Monday of the month (excluding January and August), the Centre hosts an open meeting for staff and interested colleagues conducting work in mental health to discuss current research, grant ideas, present challenges being faced in research and having space to support and help each other. We aim to create a friendly, accessible and safe space for open chat about anything related to mental health research.

There are time slots to present each month, alongside open discussions and invited speakers. If you are interested in attending the sessions or would like to sign up to present at one of our upcoming meetings please complete this Microsoft Form.

For more details, contact una.foye@kcl.ac.uk.