Your views matter
By: Karen Shaw
We want to hear different viewpoints on why there are higher rates of suicide in women nurses.
This new year marks an exciting milestone for our project. We are now inviting nurses and stakeholders to take part in interviews or focus groups for the first of our five studies. Our aim is to understand how distress and suicidality are characterised in current policy and research, and what the impact of this is.
We’ve been working on Study 1 since June 2024, reviewing existing policy and research relating to suicide. We will now take these findings and ask how they reflect the reality of nurses working in health and social care.
First, stakeholders will take part in interviews to give their views as employers, policy makers, nursing charities, researchers or union leaders. After this, nurses are invited to join focus groups to discuss how the narrative in suicide policy and research matches their own experiences. These interviews and groups will be run by experienced researchers and are safe spaces to express your views.
An important milestone
Reaching this milestone is incredibly important to the team as it is the aim at the heart of our research: to capture and to amplify voices and experiences. We believe that research should be carried out collaboratively with the people who will be impacted by it. After all, who understands a situation better than those experiencing it?
Nurses have shaped our work from the very start: we have a dedicated nurse advisory group who contribute to designing, planning and implementing the research.
How to get involved
If you are a registered woman nurse working in the UK, in any sector of nursing, and would like more information about getting involved please look at the study webpage, email us or get in touch via our website. We’re particularly keen to speak to a diverse group of nurses who reflect the breadth of the nursing workforce in the UK and to hear how experiences differ.
We are a team working with nurses, for nurses. This is a chance to be part of something truly impactful—an opportunity to help shape the direction of future research and policy to improve the wellbeing of healthcare staff for years to come.
Study 1: Multi-stakeholder perspectives on distress and suicidality in women nurses: UK has received a Favourable Ethical Opinion from the University of Surrey: ref 0347