Casey Regan

Miss Regan commenced her PhD in January 2020 with the School of Psychology, University of Newcastle. Her research aims to reduce chronic disease risk among people with a mental health condition by increasing preventive care delivery in community-based mental health settings through tailored practice change interventions. Miss Regan has contributed to the development, implementation, and evaluation of such interventions across two projects in community-based mental health settings. She completed her Bachelor of Psychology (Honours) at the University of Newcastle in 2019, during which she explored the receipt of smoking cessation care in community mental health services.

Presentation

Abstract

Title: Co-developing an intervention to support a community managed organisation to provide preventive care

Authors: Casey Regan, Julia Dray, Caitlin Fehily, Kate Bartlem, Jenny Bowman, Libby Campbell

Introduction: People with a mental health condition are more likely than the general population to engage in poor lifestyle behaviours such as smoking tobacco, being physically inactive, having a poor diet and consuming alcohol at harmful levels. Community managed organisations (CMOs) represent an opportune setting to support mental health consumers in improving their lifestyle behaviours. This study aims to summarise the co-development of a pilot intervention which will build the capacity of staff of a CMO to provide care to support their consumers’ in achieving lifestyle behaviour change goals.

Method: Two three-hour workshops will be conducted with staff members (approx. n=15) of one NSW CMO. The aim of the workshops is to lead end-users to put forward potential strategies to support staff in providing care for lifestyle behaviours. A series of activities will gather insights, ideas and set priorities. Qualitative inductive thematic analysis will be conducted on the workshop transcripts. Participants will also complete a survey about their perceptions of the potential support strategies, and an evaluation of the workshops as a co-development process.

Expected Findings: Co-development workshops are expected to occur in May 2021. Findings of the workshops will be presented, including: key themes identified from the thematic analysis of the dialogue transcript; perceived feasibility, acceptability and appropriateness of identified support strategies; and the effectiveness of the workshops as a co-development process.

Discussion: Findings from the workshops will inform the development of a pilot intervention to increase the delivery of support for lifestyle factors among consumers with a mental health condition who access community managed organisations. Using a co-development process to develop intervention support strategies to improve care engages end users. Therefore, co-developed strategies are more likely to be feasible and acceptable to end users, as they are designed to meet the needs of consumers and staff; optimising the likelihood of their potential impact.