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First Findings

On 28 Oct 2020, early findings of a research project exploring the impact of COVID-19 visiting restrictions on the relatives of care home relatives, were shared.

Organisations supporting family carers affected were invited by the Centre for Research on Families and Relationships to this session.

Dr George Pallitiyill, Senior Lecturer in the School of Social and Political Science at the University of Edinburgh opened the event. George outlined that the project aimed to capture the social and emotional impact of restrictions on family carers, as well as identify positive and creative practices that have made a positive difference to families during this difficult time.

There were 36 interviews with family carers of relatives in older people’s care homes, 19 interviews with senior stakeholders, and 5 creative cafes with social care staff. In addition to this 444 family carers responded to an online survey using the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ 12), to understand the impact on their mental health, with this yielding 444 responses.

Watch

Members of the team, Dr Sarah Noone and Professor Lynn Jamieson presented these initial findings, which can be viewed in this video.

Full findings will be available shortly, and a series of up and coming engagement events will share findings and recommendations with a number of audiences: policy-makers, members of the social care workforce, family carers.

Listen

Alternatively we have edited the video into two convenient Iriss.fm episodes.

About

This project was funded by the Chief Scientist Office, Scottish Government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The field work took place between May-October 2020.

The project was delivered by partners from the University of Edinburgh, University of Strathclyde, The University of the West of Scotland and Iriss.

If you wish to follow up on the early findings’ session, please contact Lynn Jamieson

Project partners

Chief Scientists Office
The University of Edinburgh
University of Strathclyde
University of the west of Scotland
Iriss
CRFR