The Housing and Dementia Research Consortium (HDRC) is a membership group that is committed to timely, high quality research focused on ‘what works’ in order to directly influence policy and practice in relation to Housing with Care and other forms of accommodation and care for people with dementia in the UK. The HDRC is hosted by the Assocation for Dementia Studies (ADS) at the University of Worcester.
Our Aims
- To shape the agenda of research into housing and care to ensure its relevance and usefulness to housing and care providers, people with dementia, their families, significant others, carers and advocates.
- To promote a collaborative approach, thereby giving greater weight to research funding applications.
- To deliver ambitious, multi-provider, multi-site research which provides robust, specific evidence on accommodation and care for people with dementia.
- To ensure that housing and care providers, residents and service users are active research partners, rather than being passive recipients or research participants.
- Providing the evidence base to inform policy, funding and practice in relation to accommodation and care in the UK.
- To contribute, more generally, to improving the evidence base on dementia and its links with the built environment and different approaches to accommodation, care and support.
- Help to disseminate findings and support the transfer of research into practice within housing settings.
Our services
The HDRC is uniquely placed to understand the housing related priorities of people living with dementia and their carers. In 2014-2015 the HDRC consulted with its members, with people living with dementia in different housing settings, their family carers and care staff in order to set the research priorities and provide an evidence base to guide the HDRC’s work.
The HDRC is well placed to understand the needs of the housing sector. The HDRC’s work is shaped by its members and steering group which include some of the largest, most innovative and well-respected housing providers in the UK.
Examples of how we can help you and your business include support with:
- Developing a dementia strategy.
- Creating a dementia friendly community.
- Carrying out research, evaluation and consultancy projects.
- Providing access to expertise through our extensive networks of academic researchers in dementia, housing and care.
- Facilitating access to research participants.
- Undertaking reviews of the literature on specific topics.
- Developing Briefing papers.
- Helping with the preparation of applications for funding.
Research Coordinator and Steering Group
The consortium has a research coordinator (funded by the steering group), Dr Julie Barrett, a Senior Research Fellow at the ADS, whose tasks include:
- Seeking appropriate funding sources, being alert to funding calls and initiating appropriate funding bids that fall within the HDRC’s research priorities
- Seeking appropriate research partners for a bid, contributing to the development of the research project and co-writing the proposal.
- Contributing to funded projects by acting as facilitator and a link to research sites (assisted by HDRC members), providing expertise on housing with care for people with dementia if needed; finding experts and service users for project advisory groups or to participate in the research, ensuring users are consulted at appropriate stages of a research project, contributing to report writing and assisting with dissemination.
- Ensuring members are informed and updated on HDRC activities activities, servicing the steering group, maintaining the website, organising the annual membership event and other PR functions.
The current steering group members are five well-established housing and care providers: the Anchor Hanover Group, ExtraCare Charitable Trust; Hallmark Care Homes; Housing 21 and Platform Housing Group. The Housing Learning and Improvement Network (Housing LIN) and the Alzheimer’s Society are also represented, as is the HDRC’s hosting organisation: the Association for Dementia Studies (ADS) at the University of Worcester.
Membership
The HDRC currently has just over 60 members, around half of which are providers of accommodation and care for older people and the rest being an array of other interested parties, including academics, architects, advisors, researchers, policy makers and third sector organisations. A consortium is only as effective as its membership. We welcome as many housing providers and other interested parties as possible to become members, and support our work.
Summary of the structure of HDRC
History
The HDRC was set up in 2008 by four leading UK providers of Housing with Care in order to develop robust evidence on care, design and the environment for people with dementia in a Housing with Care setting. In Summer 2013 the research remit was broadened to include other types of accommodation and care arrangements available to people with dementia. The HDRC was originally hosted by Housing 21 (a provider of Retirement Living and Extra Care properties); since 2014 it has been hosted by the Association for Dementia Studies (ADS) at the University of Worcester.
If you would like further information please contact the Research Coordinator, Dr Julie Barrett: j.barrett@worc.ac.uk
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