Newcastle University

Introduction

I am a medical sociologist with a background in critical health psychology.  For the last 8 years I have worked with collegues across a range of disciplines, using qualitative methods to explore research questions around the implementation and development of new health technologies and services. This work has almost entirely concerned technologies for 'older people' across many different life stages and contexts: from pre-retirement through to residential and secondary care.

Qualifications

• PhD.  Medical Sociology: ‘Epistemological authority and hidden work: negotiated meaning in the conduct of a randomised controlled trial’, Newcastle University, (2009).
• Master of Arts (Hons), Psychology, Second Class Honours, First Division (2:1): ‘Prostate Cancer and the Lives of Current Survivors: A Phenomenological Study’, Massey University, New Zealand, (2002).
• Bachelor of Arts, Psychology, Massey University, New Zealand, (2000)

Informal Interests

• Traditional film-based photography using medium and large format cameras (landscape and portraiture) including the subsequent processes of development, scanning, digital processing, printing and mounting
• Walking
• Brewing ales and lager using traditional (time-intensive!) methods and 'raw' ingredients
• Drinking above home-made beers with friends!

Research Interests

My research interests fall into two specific areas;

1) Diversity in the interests of clinicians, researchers and patient/lay groups, regarding the conceptualisation, development and implementation of new health care technologies for older people (from pre-retirement through to the older-old). In particular I am interested in the functional purpose of these differences, and how they are negotiated in practice across research settings and the clinical-research encounter.

2) I have an interest in the manner in which problems of health and social care are enacted within clinical interactions, the forms of knowledge that are drawn on to shape these interactions, and the way in which clinical practices and conditions are problematized and reconfigured by researchers situated outside the clinical encounter.

Combined, these interests lead to a central question: how are knowledge’s, identities and practices coordinated and negotiated in health and social care?

Other Expertise

Ethnographic research including participant observation.

Current Work

Currently I work on the LiveWell programme: a 5 year study to develop a suite of interventions, and associated outcome measures, to promote health and wellbeing in the peri-retirement window.  In the first instance I am responsible for a systematic review of interventions targeting social factors with health and wellbeing outcomes for people approaching, and beyond retirement.  I will also be involved with intervention development including user-engagement and qualitative investigations to ascertain the feasibility and acceptability of prototype interventions.  My work in LiveWell involves close collaboration with colleagues from a range of disciplines including health and cognitive psychology, social gerontology, dietetics, movement science and science and technology studies

Projects

• Implementing healthier menus in residential care homes for older people: evaluation of barriers, facilitators and the impact on dietary intake
  Project Leader(s): Prof Paula Moynihan, Prof Chris Seal, Prof Carl May, Prof Ashley Adamson, Mr Mark Deverill
• mappmal: multidisciplinary approach to develop a prototype for the prevention of malnutrition in older people: products, people, places and procedures
  Project Leader(s): Prof Paula Moynihan, Prof Carl May, Prof Patrick Olivier, Prof Alastair Macdonald (Glasgow School of Art), Dr Lisa Methven (University of Reading), Prof Margot Gosney (University of Reading).
• The LiveWell Programme: Developing pragmatic interventions to enhance health and wellbeing in later life
  Project Leader(s): Management team: Prof. John Mathers (Leader investigator), Prof. Martin White (co-investigator), Dr Thomas Meyer (co-investigator), Prof. Paula Moynihan (co-investigator), Prof. Lynn Rochester (co-investigator), Dr Falko Sniehotta (co-inverstigator).

I currently co-supervise a Master's Student

I am also one of a panel of supervisors for a PhD student, advising in the application of ethnographic methods. 

Other teaching-related roles include:

• Course Tutor (2008, 2010): Undergraduate Module: Medicine in the community
•  Deputy course administrator (2010-11): Undergraduate Module: Medicine in the community 
•  Internal Assessor for PhD student (2010)
•  Contribution to the Further Methods in Health Research Module (2010): Lecture on Ethnography and participant observation

 Other Activities 

 Reviewer for:

• Qualitative Health Research (2011)
• British Journal of Health Psychology, (2007 & 2008)
• Implementation Science (2008)
• Social Science & Medicine (2007)

• Heaven B, Bamford C, May CR, Moynihan P. Food work and feeding assistance on hospital wards. Sociology of Health and Illness 2013, (epub ahead of print).
• Bamford C, Heaven B, May CR, Moynihan P. Implementing nutrition guidelines for older people in residential care homes: a qualitative study using Normalization Process Theory. Implementation Science 2012, 7(1), 106.
• Heaven B. Bridging the Ontological Divide: Different Social Worlds in the Conduct of a Pilot Study. In: Will, C., Moreira, T, ed. Medical Proofs, Social Experiments: Clinical Trials in Shifting Contexts. Farnham: Ashgate, 2010, pp.39-47.
• Speed C, Heaven B, Adamson A, Bond J, Corbett S, Lake AA, May C, Vanoli A, McMeekin P, Moynihan P, Rubin G, Steen IN, McColl E. LIFELAX - diet and LIFEstyle versus LAXatives in the management of chronic constipation in older people: randomised controlled trial. Health Technology Assessment 2010, 14(52), 1-251.
• Heaven B, Bamford C, May C, Moynihan P. When 30-40cms becomes a problem: Feeding, food-work and the space between patient and plate on hospital wards. . In: British Sociological Association - Medical Sociology Conference. 2010, Durham University, UK.
• Rapley T, Heaven B, May C, Kay L, Foster H. An evidence and practice based regional musculoskeletal examination for school-aged children - Prems. In: Rheumatology: Annual Meeting of the British Society of Rheumatology. 2009, Glasgow, UK: Oxford University Press.
• Bamford C, Heaven B, May C, Moynihan P. Implementing healthier menus in care homes for older people. In: Gerontological Society of America 62nd Annual Scientific Meeting. 2009, Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
• Heaven B, Exley C, Finch T, May C. Instability, conflict and regaining epistemological control: An ethnographic account of a trial-team at work. In: British Sociological Association: Medical Sociology Conference. 2008, University of Sussex, Brighton.
• Lake AA, Speed C, Brookes AL, Heaven BRJ, Adamson AJ, Moynihan PJ, Corbett SS, McColl EMM. Development of a series of patient information leaflets for constipation using a range of cognitive interview techniques: LIFELAX. BMC Health Services Research 2007, 7(3).
• Kaner EFS, Heaven BRJ, Rapley TJ, Murtagh MJ, Graham RH, Thomson RG, May CR. Medical communication and technology: a video-based process study of the use of decision aids in primary care consultations. BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making 2007, 7(1), 2.
• Murtagh MJ, Thomson RG, May CR, Rapley TJ, Heaven BRJ, Graham RH, Kaner EFS, Stobbart L, Eccles PJ. Qualitative methods in a randomised controlled trial: the role of an integrated qualitative process evaluation in providin evidence to discontinue the intervention in one arm of a triapof a decision support tool. Quality and Safety in Health Care 2007, 16(3), 224-229.
• May C, Finch T, Mair F, Ballini L, Dowrick C, Eccles M, Gask L, MacFarlane A, Murray E, Rapley T, Rogers A, Treweek S, Wallace P, Anderson G, Burns J, Heaven B. Understanding the implementation of complex interventions in health care: The normalization process model. BMC Health Services Research 2007, 7(148), 7.
• Rapley TJ, May CR, Heaven BRJ, Murtagh MJ, Graham RH, Kaner EFS, Thomson RG. Doctor-patient interaction in a randomised controlled trial of decision-support tools. Social Science & Medicine 2006, 62(9), 2267-2278.
• Heaven BRJ, Murtagh MJ, Rapley TJ, May CR, Graham RH, Kaner EFS, Thomson RG. Patients or research subjects? A qualitative study of participation in a randomised controlled trial of a complex intervention. Patient Education and Counseling 2006, 62(2), 260-270.
• May C, Rapley T, Moreira T, Finch T, Heaven B. Technogovernance: Evidence, subjectivity, and the clinical encounter in primary care medicine. Social Science and Medicine 2006, 62(4), 1022-1030.
• Heaven BR, Murtagh MJ, Rapley T, Kaner EF, May CR, Thomson RG. Epistemological status of patients in a randomised controlled trial. In: European Association for the Study of Science and Technology conference. 2005, Paris, France.
• Kaner EFS, Heaven B, Rapley T, Murtagh M, Thomson R, May C. [abstract] 'It ain't what you do, it's the way that you do it': an observational study of doctor-patient interactions during shared-decision making in primary care. Family Practice 2005, 22(S1), 67-68.