The funding will be used to recruit new team members, allowing us to extend existing work and contribute to new mental health projects. It will also allow us to strengthen and consolidate our capacity in key areas of our mental health research. These include applied data science, adoption of our findings and public involvement.
The NIHR programme aims to build capacity and capability to conduct and translate high quality mental health research. It is an opportunity to address a range of mental health conditions in geographical areas that have been historically under-served by research activity or where there is a high unmet mental health burden.
The projects which will directly benefit from the new researchers include:
Mental health of newly arrived asylum seekers in Bristol – the first project identified by the Health Ambassadors
A PhD project on student mental health
Lucy Biddle, ARC West co-Theme Lead for Mental Health, said:
“We are very pleased to have received this funding, which is a testament to ARC West’s strong track record of co-producing mental health research with marginalised groups.
“We have identified several projects which could make a real difference to people’s lives. This award allows us to fund new staff to contribute to these projects, and to build our capability in key areas such as public involvement from under-served communities in mental health research. We look forward to rising to this challenge.”