Thesis Title:
Making the most of the annual physical health check for people with serious mental illnesses
Thesis Abstract:
People with serious mental illnesses e.g. schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, are more likely than people without serious mental illness to have physical health problems such as heart attacks and strokes. As a result their life expectancy is 10-20 years shorter.
To try to improve the health of people with serious mental illnesses, they are offered an annual physical health check with their General Practitioner or mental health team. Although a lot of effort has been put into improving the number of people who have these checks, there is limited research on how effective they are in long term health improvement.
This project will undertake three separate studies:
- Systematic review of the research published so far about what helps and hinders people with serious mental illnesses from attending their annual health checks
- Analysis of anonymised GP records for thousands of people with serious mental illnesses, to see whether the people who attended the check regularly had better health over time than people who did not
Interviews with people with serious mental illnesses who have recently attended their annual physical health check, as well as professionals who regularly carry out the checks. These interviews will explore which aspects of the check they find helpful, or less helpful and how they think their overall health and lifestyle changed because of the checks.
Primary Supervisor:
Dr Natalie Shoham