About ConnectED
Who is involved?
We are a partnership of local authority ASC departments, service providers, universities and service users and carers:
- Bristol City Council.
- North Somerset.
- South Gloucestershire.
- Sirona Health and Care.
- Age UK Bristol.
- Bristol University and the University of the West of England.
- ConnectED Service Users and Carers Advisory Group.
In addition, we have the support of a number of other organisations, including the Integrated care Board, the local NIHR Research Design Service (who help design research), the local Clinical Research Network (who help deliver research), and Research in Practice.
What are we doing?
This project aims to help decision-makers in Adult Social Care make better decisions by growing their ability to use research.
The ConnectED partnership works to achieve this, by:
- helping social care managers and practitioners use research to make the best decisions they can
- building research capacity
- ensuring that researchers address the things that matter to people with lived experience and carers and practitioners.
Our Research Practice Partnerships (RPPs) take a ‘learning by doing’ approach building the capacity of staff to find and appraise research.
We have created new roles and new ways of working.
Researchers in Residence
We have researchers in each local authority, in Sirona Health and Care, and Age UK Bristol. These ‘Researchers in Residence’ (RiR) spend between 2 and 3 days a week in each agency, working with practitioners to help them access research that is relevant to their work and to the people with lived experience and carers with whom they work.
Evidence champions
Each agency has designated a practitioner to act as an Evidence Champion. They have protected time to work closely with their Researcher in Residence and a person with lived experience or carer. Together they will help to develop a better understanding of research and how to use it in social care.
Service User and Carer Advisory Group
The Service User and Carer Advisory Group (SUCAG) identifies a member, who is a person with lived experience or carer, to work alongside the Researchers in Residence and Evidence Champions in particular areas of practice. By working closely together on issues that matter, the research practice partnerships help to bridge the gap between the worlds of research, practice and lived experience.
