Career Development Awardee
B.A.Heath@leeds.ac.uk
I grew up in a family run care home that prides itself on providing outstanding quality care. Passionate about combining research with practice, I transitioned from frontline roles to research translation roles. I’m now excited to be pursuing a full-time applied research position to work with the sector to improve social care.
Bronte’s research interests include:
- Care homes
- Workforce (recruitment, retention, development)
- Dementia
- Decision-making and quality
Read more about Bronte’s Career Development Award plans
Building solid foundations in social care research for a future doctoral award application
This award will help me build my career as a researcher in social care. It will provide me with the experience and skills to apply for a PhD. I have experience working in care homes and want to focus my research career on how care home managers make decisions. This is important because managers’ decisions affect staff, residents and the quality of care.
I will build my expertise in research methods by completing training in qualitative research and discrete choice experiments. To help refine the focus of my PhD, I will also carry out a review of the literature to understand what is known about managers’ decision-making.
I will strengthen my patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) skills by shadowing meetings before setting up my own PPIE group of care home managers to share their experiences. These insights will be crucial in informing my planned activities. Over the course of the award, I will also hold between 2-3 online groups with relatives to ensure my research is relevant and shaped by those affected.
I will expand my professional networks by connecting with academics, collaborating with care sector organisations like the National Care Forum, and attending conferences. I will strengthen my academic profile through publishing papers and – with stakeholders – translating findings into accessible formats for the sector.
Together, these activities will build my skills, networks, and track record to enable me to submit a competitive PhD application.
