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Fieldwork encounters are not only contingent to biographical subjectivities, but are mediated by a confluence of identity, place and embodiment. This paper offers reflexive accounts of researchers with various socio-cultural and disciplinary backgrounds, who collaborated as a team to examine the varied funerary experiences and needs of established minorities and recent migrants in England and Wales. Focusing on the researchers' varied personal experiences with death and bereavement and on their performances of minority and majority ethnic and migrant identities, the paper highlights the mediated and embodied nature of fieldwork. It argues that reflection on the various aspects of intersectional researcher identity is necessary for a rigorous fieldwork practice that takes transparency and politics into account. This facilitates a deeper understanding of the positionality of both researchers and interlocutors, and the situated co-production of knowledge. In doing so, the paper illustrates that conducting research with a diverse team of researchers contributes to better understanding the complexity and multifacetedness of social phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Aims: Long‐acting injectable buprenorphine (LAIB) is a new treatment for opioid use disorder that is generating positive outcomes. Negative effects are typically mild and transient, but can occasionally be serious, resulting in treatment discontinuation/non‐adherence. This paper aims to analyse patients' accounts of how they felt during the first 72 h after initiating LAIB. Methods: Semi‐structured interviews were conducted (June 2021–March 2022) with 26 people (18 males and 8 females) who had started LAIB within the previous 72 h. Participants were recruited from treatment services in England and Wales and were interviewed by telephone using a topic guide. Interviews were audio‐recorded, transcribed and coded. The concepts of embodiment and embodied cognition framed the analyses. Data on participants' substance use, initiation onto LAIB and feelings were tabulated. Next, participants' accounts of how they felt were analysed following the stages of Iterative Categorization. Results: Participants reported complex combinations of changing negative and positive feelings. Bodily experiences included withdrawal symptoms, poor sleep, injection‐site pain/soreness, lethargy and heightened senses inducing nausea ('distressed bodies'), but also enhanced somatic wellbeing, improved sleep, better skin, increased appetite, reduced constipation and heightened senses inducing pleasure ('returning body functions'). Cognitive responses included anxiety, uncertainties and low mood/depression ('the mind in crisis') and improved mood, greater positivity and reduced craving ('feeling psychologically better'). Whereas most negative effects reported are widely recognized, the early benefits of treatment described are less well‐documented and may be an overlooked distinctive feature of LAIB. Conclusions: During the first 72 h after initiating long‐acting injectable buprenorphine, new patients report experiencing a range of interconnected positive and negative short‐term effects. Providing new patients with information about the range and nature of these effects can prepare them for what to expect and help them manage feelings and reduce anxiety. In turn, this may increase medication adherence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Domiciliary care workers (DCWs) continued to provide care to adults in their own homes throughout the COVID‐19 pandemic. The evidence of the impact of COVID‐19 on health outcomes of DCWs is currently mixed. The OSCAR study will quantify the impact of COVID‐19 upon health outcomes of DCWs in Wales, explore causes of variation and extrapolate to the rest of the UK DCW population. An embedded qualitative study aimed to explore DCW experiences during the pandemic, including factors that may have varied risk of exposure to COVID‐19 and adverse health and wellbeing outcomes. Registered DCWs working throughout Wales were invited to participate in a semi‐structured telephone interview. 24 DCWs were interviewed between February and July 2021. Themes were identified through inductive analysis using thematic coding. Several themes emerged relating to risk of exposure to COVID‐19. First, general changes to the role of the DCW during the pandemic were identified. Second, practical challenges for DCWs in the workplace were reported, including staff shortages, clients and families not following safety procedures, initial shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE), DCW criticism of standard use PPE, client difficulty with PPE and management of rapid antigen testing. Third, lack of government/employer preparation for a pandemic was described, including the reorganisation of staff clients and services, inadequate or confusing information for many DCWs, COVID‐19 training and the need for improved practical instruction and limited official standard risk assessments for DCWs. Pressure to attend work and perceptions of COVID‐19 risk and vaccination was also reported. In summary, this paper describes the risk factors associated with working during the pandemic. We have mapped recommendations for each problem using these qualitative findings including tailored training and better support for isolated team members and identified the required changes at several socio‐ecological levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the ways in which older people's residential and nursing homes can constitute heteronormative environments – social spaces in which the same-sex attractions and desires of residents are disregarded in the provision of everyday care. The aim of this discussion is to examine the synergies and differences between older lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) adults' expectations for future care home provision and the expectations of care staff and managers in providing residential services to older people with diverse sexual backgrounds. We present qualitative evidence from research into the provision of care environments in Wales. In this paper, we present findings from two cohorts: first, from five focus groups with care and nursing staff and managers; and second, from 29 semi-structured interviews with older LGB adults (50–76 years) residing in urban and rural locations across Wales. We argue that residential care environments can constitute heterosexualised spaces in which LGB identities are neglected in comparison to the needs and preferences of other residents. To this extent, we discuss how care staff and managers can be more attentive and responsive to the sexual biographies of all residents and argue against the separation of care and sexual orientation in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Background Research on staffed housing for people with intellectual disability has identified the challenges in achieving postitive quality of life outcomes. However, a less well considered dimension of such services is that they are places of living and dying. This paper looks at the experiences of staff in dealing with issues of death and dying. Method In depth qualitative interviews were held with 22 staff in 5 different providers and who had experienced, in total, 27 deaths of people with intellectual disability. Results The data highlight that staff felt providing a good quality of care at the end of life was an important but unrecognised dimension of their work. This work could be broken down into several different phases, dying, death and beyond death. Bad deaths were felt to be those deaths which prevented staff from 'being there' with individuals over those phases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - This paper seeks to explore staff experiences of working in Crisis Resolution and Home Treatment (CRHT). There is a paucity of research in the area and a particular lack of in-depth qualitative accounts of staff experiences with most research focused on output and outcomes of CRHTs, including inpatient admission and bed-occupancy rates.Design/methodology/approach - Interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) was used to investigate participants' experiences of working in this service context. Five CRHT workers were interviewed about their experiences, including the aspects of their work that they found enjoyable and those that they found stressful, and how they coped with challenges related to the work.Findings - Three master themes, each with corresponding subordinate themes, emerged from the analysis. These were: "motivating factors", "stressors" and "coping". These findings indicated these subjective experiences emphasised the opportunities to make a difference and help service users and build therapeutic relationships. Perceived stressors were understood in the context of a complex service context, operational issues, responsibility for service users, and supervision and training needs.Research limitations/implications - The implications of the research for CRHT staff are discussed as well as the limitations of this study.Originality/value - This study offers a timely development in understanding the experiences of staff working in CRHTs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing status and regard of indigenous minority languages across Europe, means the advantages of bilingualism for individuals and communities are now well established. We set out to elicit parents' and health professionals' views of the role of health visitors and midwives in promoting bilingualism in the family and to consider whether health professionals acknowledge the contribution that bilingualism makes to public health. A three-year study was completed to measure the impact of a language transmission initiative which depends on the input of midwives and health visitors with new parents and how its effect could be improved. This paper reports on one element of that study. A qualitative approach was used. Six focus group interviews were conducted with health visitors and midwives and 33 postnatal interviews were completed with parents across four counties in Wales. Thematic content analysis was undertaken by two researchers, a third trailed decision processes and scrutinised categories and themes. Findings suggest that health visitors and midwives perceive their roles relating to the promotion of bilingualism differently. Influences on their involvement include their language profile, contact with parents, personal experience, timing of the interaction and time in their workload. The relationship between promoting bilingualism and public health was accepted by some and denied by others. Data from the interviews with parents suggested that few health professionals discuss issues of language transmission with new parents. Some individual health visitors and midwives are willing to promote bilingualism with parents. However, there are challenges in enlisting the support of health visitors and midwives to discuss language transmission and bilingualism with parents. These findings challenge practitioners to consider their role in promoting bilingualism and its effect on public health and suggest the need for more defined responsibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accessible summary • As people frequently encounter others in mental distress, there is a need for appropriate knowledge and skills to provide support. Mental Health First Aid, a 12-h mental health promotion programme was developed to address this. • There has been little research into basic mental health training programmes generally, in terms of their usefulness. The views of instructors delivering these programmes are also important, as this may provide information about the most effective way of delivering mental health training programmes to a wide audience. • In this study, instructors delivering the Mental Health First Aid programme in Wales were asked to give their views and experiences of delivering the programme. • These instructors said it was important they had the necessary skills and support to enable them to deliver the programme effectively. Mental health literacy among the public is often poor, and although people frequently encounter others experiencing mental distress in their workplace, families and communities, they may be ill-equipped to provide appropriate support. ‘Mental Health First Aid’ (MHFA), a 12-h mental health promotion programme seeks to address this, training people in the knowledge and skills needed to engage with someone experiencing mental health problems. Research relating to the MHFA programme has centred on course attendees, with a paucity of research surrounding the delivery of basic mental health training programmes. Understanding experiences of instructors delivering such programmes is key to the success of future delivery. This study sought to identify the views and experiences of instructors delivering the MHFA programme in Wales. Fourteen MHFA instructors participated in semi-structured audio-recorded interviews, with the transcripts analysed to identify key themes. This paper explores two of the identified themes namely prerequisite skills and support required by instructors. The study highlighted that because of the ensuing emotional labour experienced by instructors, universal mental health training programmes must put in place a clear infrastructure to train, support and monitor those delivering them, for programme roll-out to be effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]