Health-care institution governance and management
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Health-care institution governance and management: The role of patient representatives
IRAS ID
131601
Contact name
Guy Edwards
Contact email
Research summary
Health services, including hospitals, are expected to deliver care that values the experience, rights and input of patients, and respects the rights of individuals to make decisions about their care. One of the ways that healthcare institutions seek to ensure that their services meet the needs of patients is by electing, appointing or co-opting ‘patient representatives’ as members of committees that provide governance and oversight functions for the institution. Patient, or in some cases public, representatives may also be involved in consultative processes, through interest groups or specially constituted processes managed by health service planners and managers.
The aim of this project is to investigate the ways in which this patient representative function and role is achieved in such committees and direct meetings. The intention is to investigate how the role of the patient is constituted through such interactions, and how patients are engaged in the work of the institution through governance and management committees. In examining the interactions that occur in meetings, this project will investigate how expertise, experience, knowledge and information are used and represented by the various actors within the institution, including medical staff, patients and other institutional agents, such as healthcare managers.
The primary data-source will be video and/or audio recordings of actual meetings, which will be transcribed and presented in de-identified form. This project will examine the actual talk-in-interaction of patients and others involved in committee work, using the well-established method of conversation analysis. This research will therefore be situated within a significant body of work that considers the patient-practitioner relationship (primarily through clinical interaction and consultations), and seek to explore other roles that patients play in the modern health system.
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - South Yorkshire Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
13/YH/0331
Date of REC Opinion
16 Oct 2013
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion