Partnerships in Care Research Database
Research type
Research Database
Full title
Partnerships in Care Research Database
IRAS ID
140688
Contact name
Conor Duggan
Contact email
Research summary
Partnerships in Care Research Database
REC name
East Midlands - Derby Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/EM/0053
Date of REC Opinion
22 Sep 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Unfavourable Opinion
Data collection arrangements
The collection of data for the Partnerships in Care (PiC) research database commenced in 2001 and involved patient data from four of the organisation's medium secure units. This comprised 935 patients. Comprehensive data, including socio-demographics, diagnoses, progress within the units/discharge and standardised risk assessments were collected on this cohort. Data on the cohort's reoffending were subsequently provided by the (then) Home Office. A number of papers in major scientific journals have been published using these data (Gray et al., 2004, Gray et al., 2007, Snowden et al. 2007, Fitzgerald et al., 2011, Alexander et al., 2012 et seq. Subsequently, an additional cohort of 859 patients from two additional units were added to the initial cohort so that the total number is now 1794. This makes it one of the largest databases of detained patients within the UK.
This current application seeks to (a) establish IRAS ethical approval for the database and (b)extend the range of outcome variables to include mortality and hospital admission after discharge for those patients on the database.Research programme
The database aims to provide information on patients detained in conditions of medium security and their outcome which can be used to inform treatment, the planning of services as well as provide material for more basic research. The database was initially managed in the School of Psychology, Cardiff University and was transferred to Partnerships in Care centrally at Borehamwood in 2011 where it currently resides. Thus far, the data have been used by academics within the School of Psychology at Cardiff University and their collaborators within PiC. The intention in transferring the data centrally was to increase its use by clinicians working within the organisation together with other external collaborators in specific projects. To our knowledge, the PiC database is almost unique within forensic medium security in its size and depth. There is a similar database at Arnold Lodge Leicester but this is smaller and is restricted to a single unit. The Special Hospitals (high secure) database is comparable but was disbanded in 2000. Extending the database to include both mortality and hospital admission data will provide important additional information as it is known that this group of detained patients suffers from excess mortality (Davies et al 2007) and have high rates of re-admission (Clarke et al 2013). A large database also provides an opportunity of describing the characteristics and outcome of subcategories (e.g. arsonists, sex offenders etc.) that otherwise might not be investigated as they are insufficiently numerous within smaller datasets. It also allows more intensive investigation of the neuropsychological mechanisms linking psychopathology to a range of outcomes in specific groups (e.g. autistic spectrum disorder). Our intention is that this database will provide a resource for the working clinician to examine and critically review aspects of his/her practice thereby identifying what works and improving patient care and outcome. It will also provide data for more sophisticated investigation with academic partners of the mechanisms linking psychopathology to behaviour.
Research database title
Partnerships in Care Research Database
Establishment organisation
Partnerships in Care
Establishment organisation address
2 Imperial Place
Maxwell Road
Borehamwood, Herts
WD6 1JN