Nine fully-funded PhD scholarships: RCSI Faculty of Nursing & Midwifery

The proposed PhD project is in collaboration with Dr Keith Rochfort and the Grain-4-Lab team at DCU. The Grain-4-Lab team have developed an innovative and more sustainable solution for dealing with single-use plastic items such as those found in hospital waste streams, and to date, the team have developed a range of plasticware using their bioplastic that have been trialled in various laboratory settings validating their use as an alternative to petroleum-based plastics.

More details of the project can be read here and here.

For this proposed PhD we aim to transition this technology to test it in healthcare products/settings. The aim of the project is to use this innovative material science technology to reduce the environmental effect of hospital waste.

The objectives of the project are to:

1. Identify the most frequently used plastic based hospital waste products (e.g. syringes, gloves, aprons, incontinence pads/nappies, IV infusion bags, IV lines, O2 Masks, theatre gowns, etc) generated in Irish Hospitals and the waste streams through which these materials are disposed.
2. Recreate a degradable version of the most commonly used plastic-based single-use products in the labs at DCU using the sustainable materials and validate their performance in line with ISO standards.
3. Pilot test the use of the new products in a hospital setting to explore their functionality under a range of criteria.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Rose Sweeney
Supervisor 2: Dr Andrea Doyle
Supervisor 3: Dr Aisling Walsh
Co-supervisor: Dr Keith Rochfort

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in biological sciences or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

Desirable specifications

An interest in materials and biomedical laboratory background are desirable. 

One of the challenges for Ireland is to adequately support the health of migrants while ensuring that the staff working in the health system have the resources, support structures and training that the need to provide care to this population who are diverse in needs, often vulnerable and traumatised. A recent study published in BMC Public Health explored the health status of migrants in the Republic of Ireland but there is very little research on the impact of the mass movement of people on the health system in terms of resource implications, support structures, staff training and other needs.

The aim of this study is to explore the impact on the health system of the immigrant population to explore how staff can be better supported, resourced and trained to provide appropriate and adequate care. The study will employ a mixed methods approach with front line staff across the health system as well as managers and policy makers.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Rose Sweeney
Supervisor 2: Dr Gintare Valentelyte
Supervisor 3: Dr Chiara Pittalis
Supervisor 4: Dr Éidín Ní Shé
Supervisor 5: Dr Jakub Gajewski

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in nursing, public health, health systems, or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

The Irish Nurses & Midwives Organisation (INMO) have called for greater supports to ensure the safety and welfare of its members. Many staff do not feel safe in the healthcare workplace.

In this study we will conduct an in-depth exploration of the experiences and support needs of healthcare staff in the context of increased levels of aggression, hostility, verbal and even physical abuse directed towards them in healthcare settings in Ireland.

A mixed methods approach will be adopted and includes key stakeholders such as those who provide care in these settings as well as managers with responsibility to keep staff safe.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Rose Sweeney
Supervisor 2: Dr Lorna Staines (School of Population Health)
Supervisor 3: Dr Tommy Kyaw-Tun (School of Medicine, Graduate Entry Medicine)
Supervisor 4: Dr James Larkin 
Supervisor 5: Dr Jakub Gajewski

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in nursing, midwifery, psychology, social sciences, or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

It is estimated that inadequate breastfeeding is responsible for 16% of child deaths each year. Breastfed children perform better on intelligence tests and are less likely to be overweight or obese later in life.

Women who breastfeed have reduced cancer and type II diabetes risk. Globally, the rates of breastfeeding fall well short of the target required to protect the health of women and children. Ireland has one of the lowest breastfeeding rates in the world. Barriers to breastfeeding include lack of appropriate breast-feeding environments in their local community and upon returning to work.

The proposed PhD will explore breast-feeding environments in Ireland in local areas and in workplaces using a citizen science approach. We will compare and contrast the environments in Ireland with those available in other European countries where breastfeeding rates are consistently higher. This project is a collaboration with Dr Regien Biesma, an academic based in the University Medical Center Utrecht (UMCG); and Professor Anthony Staines, Chair of Health Systems Research at DCU.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Rose Sweeney
Supervisor 2: Dr Claire Timon
Supervisor 3: Dr Angela Flynn
Co-supervisor: Prof .Anthony Staines
Co-supervisor: Dr Regien Biesma

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in nursing, midwifery, nutrition, social sciences, anthropology, social geography, urban planning or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary areas outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

Key concepts in economics are equity, equality, and justice and essential in determining the allocation and effective and efficient use of scarce resources. There is an intersection with Social Determinants of Health (SDoH), which are the conditions in which people are born into, grow, work, live, and age, the systems put in place to deal with illness.

The SDoH are the non-medical factors that influence health outcomes (WHO) which include: income and social protection, education, unemployment and job insecurity, working life conditions, food insecurity, housing, basic amenities and the environment, early childhood development, social inclusion and non-discrimination, structural conflict, and access to affordable health services of decent quality.

Commercial Determinants of Health (CDoH) are a key social determinant, and refer to the conditions, actions and omissions by commercial actors that affect health. Company choices in the production, price-setting and targeted marketing of products, such as breast-milk substitutes, ultra-processed foods, tobacco, sugar-sweetened beverages and alcohol lead to diseases such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and certain cancers, as well as hypertension and obesity.

This PhD will explore models in which public interests are prioritised over private interests, and where commercial organisations work to enhance global health. A mixed-methods approach incorporating health economic techniques will be adopted to identify and distinguish between organisations that contribute to negative health outcomes versus those that promote positive, healthy outcomes and explore the social, economic and environmental impact of CDoH on public health in Ireland.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Lynch
Supervisor 2: Dr James Larkin
Supervisor 3: Dr Caitriona Cahir

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in public health, health systems, economics, psychology, social sciences, or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) recommends the use of Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) and Cost Utility Analysis (CUA) (NICE, 2013), and the HM Treasury advises the use of Social Cost Benefit Analysis (SCBA) for the evaluation of public health interventions (HM Treasury, 2022). SCBA is the default and preferred option to ascertain whether the benefits of a programme outweigh the costs. 

SROI is a pragmatic outcome-focused framework of SCBA that takes account of the economic, environmental, and social value of interventions combining qualitative narratives as well as quantitative/financial measurements of real-world research. Social Return on Investment (SROI) can provide meaningful insight on economic evaluation of health interventions that is beneficial for policymakers, funders, and practitioners of public health intervention to improve health and wellbeing outcomes.

SROI realises in a monetised form the value of a wide range of outcomes, whether these already have a financial value or not. SROI analysis produces a narrative for how an organisation creates value for key stakeholders and provides a Social Value Ratio (SVR) that states how much social value (in £) is created for every £1 of investment.

The aim of this studentship is to conduct an SROI analysis to develop a programme-level theory of change to establish how inputs (e.g. costs, staffing) are converted into outputs (e.g. numbers of Connect users from selected community groups), and subsequently into outcomes that matter to individuals/stakeholders affected by the Connect intervention (e.g. prevention and management of NCDs).

A mixed methods approach incorporating health economic techniques will be adopted to evaluate the outcome assessments of coach-led digital health platform and evidencing and valuing outcomes for all relevant stakeholders.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Lynch
Supervisor 2: Dr Tommy Kyaw-Tun (School of Medicine, Graduate Entry Medicine)
Supervisor 3: Dr Padraic Dunne

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in public health, psychology, social sciences, economics, or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

The purpose is to inform an understanding of the taxonomy of uses associated with HSE outdoor estates in the development of a conceptual model of the relationships between natural capital, health and well-being benefits and their beneficiaries, and in addition to conduct an in-depth review of the scientific and grey literature to reveal metrics of the physical and monetary flows of ecosystem service benefits from the outdoor estate.

This PhD studentship is to devise a conceptual model that sets out the relationships between the natural capital assets of a greenspace, the ecosystem services that are derived from those assets, the beneficiaries of those ecosystem services and the health and well-being outcomes experienced by those beneficiaries.

A mixed methods approach incorporating health economic techniques will be adopted to estimate the CBA of HSE greenspace to improve health and well-being in work for HSE employees.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Lynch
Supervisor 2: Dr Jolanta Burke
Supervisor 3: Dr Siobhan McCarthy

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in public health, health systems, psychology, social sciences, nursing, economics or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

The aim of this studentship is to develop a system-level approach to model the economic arguments of implementing interventions to prevent/improve frailty and delayed transfers of care for older people with complex and heterogeneous needs.

This research will simulate the reality of supply-side availability and constraints and use conventional economic theory to understand economic incentives and outcomes for patients and stakeholders such as the HSE and social services. A mixed methods approach will be adopted to examine the use of health and care services in elderly populations and forecasting on demand, and exploring equitable distribution of services.

This studentship will determine the use of community assets and social prescribing interventions that could impact positively on frailty and health and well-being outcomes. In addition, this project will incorporate health economic techniques to estimate the social, economic and environmental impact of investment in frailty interventions.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Lynch
Supervisor 2: Dr Suzanne McDonough
Supervisor 3: Prof. Helen French

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in public health, health systems, psychology, social sciences, nursing, economics or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.

Developing climate-informed health surveillance systems can greatly enhance the capacity of health systems to prepare for and adapt to increasing climate-sensitive disease risks and outbreaks. There is a requirement that health workforces are increasingly informed and trained on the connection between climate change and health, and capacity-building covers a comprehensive set of relevant skills and is routinely integrated into health workforce development (WHO, 2021).

Weather patterns in KwuZula-Natal (KZN) province in South Africa are less predictable due to climate change causing significant disruption in communication, severe flood damage, limited access to safe, clean drinking water and infectious disease outbreaks causing deaths. An early warning system would assist communities/health systems to prepare/manage risk during weather-related flooding.

This studentship will assess resilience of health systems to respond to flooding and health work force and facility assessment taking a mixed method approach. This will involve piloting a developed training programme (policy development, risk assessment, disaster management, emergency preparedness) in tandem with a mentorship –group and individual programme to build the capacity and capabilities of healthcare workers building resilience for disaster risk management.

The evaluation will apply an overarching Realist Evaluation (RE) and Social Return on Investment (SROI) approach (focus groups, interviews and questionnaires) to evaluate the efficiency, acceptability and cost effectiveness of the impact of training and mentoring on health outcomes during flooding in KZN province. Modules will be developed and delivered over a 12-month period. Modules will focus on leadership skills, risk assessment and disaster management, using data to inform decision making and planning in the health service.

Training will consist of didactic teaching, group work, case studies and workplace-based exercises delivered through a combination of in-person and online sessions. Pre and post training evaluations will be conducted to assess changes in knowledge and practice. The training of healthcare workers will go beyond the facilities in the study sites and will be extended to the relevant healthcare workers in health facilities in all 11 health districts in KZN province. An expected minimum of 200 healthcare workers will be trained.
 
The objectives of the project are:

1. To assess the resilience of the health system to respond in an EWE
2. Survey of health workforce knowledge awareness and practice
3. Risk assessment of facilities to establish climate resilience in terms of WHO building blocks
4. To train and mentor healthcare workers on how to ensure a resilient health system and respond in extreme weather events
5. To explore the social, economic and environmental impact of training for healthcare workers in building resilience.

Supervisor 1: Prof. Mary Lynch
Supervisor 2: Prof. Mary Rose Sweeney
Supervisor 3: Dr Chiara Pittalis

Mandatory specification

Candidates for this project will require a background in public health, health systems, psychology, social sciences, nursing, economics or other cognate discipline. All candidates should have a minimum of a 2:1 honours degree (level 8) in the disciplinary area outlined or in a cognate discipline. Candidates should be highly motivated, enthusiastic individuals.