School of Health Sciences
 

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Kristian Pollock

Professor of Medical Sociology, Faculty of Medicine & Health Sciences

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Biography

Kristian is Professor of Medical Sociology at the Nottingham Centre for the Advancement of Research into Supportive, Palliative and End of Life Care (NCARE). She studied social anthropology at the universities of Edinburgh and Cambridge, and completed a PGCHE at Keele University in 2007. She has carried qualitative research in a wide range of health service settings, often involving sensitive topics and vulnerable populations and has experience of undertaking observation, interviews, focus groups, and case studies as well as mixed methods research.

Expertise Summary

  • Qualitative research methods
  • Research ethics
  • Lay and professional understanding of health and illness
  • Communication in medical consultations
  • Advance care planning
  • End of life care
  • Dementia
  • Death and dying

Teaching Summary

Kristian's main teaching involvement is in supervision of Masters and PhD students.

Taught sessions include

  • Critical Perspectives on end of life care
  • Qualitative Research Methods
  • Contemporary Debates in Healthcare
  • Interprofessional Learning: End of Life Care
  • Research ethics

Research Summary

Kristian's research interests centre on the study of death in society, including public attitudes towards, and patient experience of, death and dying, place of death, Advance Care Planning, medicines… read more

Recent Publications

  • BOWERS, BEN, POLLOCK, KRISTIAN and BARCLAY, STEPHEN, 2022. Unwelcome memento mori or best clinical practice? Community end of life anticipatory medication prescribing practice: A mixed methods observational study PALLIATIVE MEDICINE. 36(1), 95-104
  • CAMERON, AMELIA, POLLOCK, KRISTIAN, WILSON, ELEANOR, BURFORD, JOHN, ENGLAND, GARY and FREEMAN, SARAH, 2022. A scoping review of end of life decision-making models used in dogs, cats and equids Vet Record. online early, (In Press.)
  • MAJUMBER, MEGHA, BOWERS, BEN, POLLOCK, KRISTIAN, GOODMAN, CLAIRE, KUHN, ISLA and BARCLAY, STEPHEN, 2022. End of life care in UK care homes - controlled drugs: systematic review and narrative synthesis BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care. Epub ahead of print,
  • POLLOCK, KRISTIAN, BULLLI, FRANCESCO, CASWELL, GLENYS, KOBA-ČEH, HANA, LUNDER, URSKA, MICCINESI, GUIDO, SEYMOUR, JANE, TOCCAFONDI, ALESSANDRO, VAN DELDEN, HANS, ZWAKMAN, MARIEKE, RIETJENS, JUDITH, VAN DER HEIDE, AGNES and KARS, MARIJKE, 2022. Patient and family caregiver perspectives of Advance Care Planning: Qualitative findings from the ACTION cluster randomised control trial of an adapted Respecting Choices intervention Mortality. (In Press.)

Current Research

Kristian's research interests centre on the study of death in society, including public attitudes towards, and patient experience of, death and dying, place of death, Advance Care Planning, medicines management and dementia. She is also interested in communication between patients and health professionals in medical consultations.

Current research projects

Thinking Ahead: Exploring and Understanding Experiences and Decisions in End of Life Care (2018 - 2020; NIHR HS&DR). Little is known about how the cultural diversity of the UK population impacts on the experience and anticipation of death and dying, and the appropriateness of current end of life care policy and professional practice. This study aims to improve the quality and experience of End of Life Care for patients and families from Black and Ethnic Minority Groups through a qualitative investigation of patient, family carer and professional perspectives of planning ahead and making decisions about future care. The study findings will be translated into learning resources for health care professionals providing end of life care for BAME patients being cared for at home.

NEON: Narrative Experiences Online.(2017 - 2022, NIHR PGfAR). NEON involves a programme of work, including the collection and analysis of an extensive body of personal recovery narratives and an RCT, to to investigate the impact of online narratives of personal recovery on people experiencing psychosis and other challenges to mental health, and how mental health workers can use such narratives as resources to support recovery.

https://www.researchintorecovery.com/NEON

Managing Medicines for Patients with Serious Illness Being Cared for at Home (2017 - 2019, NIHR HS&DR). The home is the primary site of care for increasing numbers of patients affected by complex, long term illnesses. This often involves taking many medicines over the course of each day, including pain killers and other powerful drugs . However, we know little about how people feel about assuming responsibility for managing complex medication regimes and how they engage with technologies of care within their homes. This project is investigating how seriously ill patients, their family care givers, friends and the health care professionals who support them, engage collaboratively in managing medicines prescribed to treat serious illness, including the relief of symptoms at the end of life.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/groups/ncare/projects/managing-medicines-for-patients-with-serious-illness-being-cared-for-at-home.aspx.

PrAISED: Promoting Activity, Independence and Stability in Early Dementia. (2016 - 2022). NIHR Programme Grant for Applied Research. PrAISED involves a programme of research employing mixed methods in eight interrelated work packages to develop and test an intervention to maintain independence, wellbeing and quality of life for people with early dementia, by promoting activity and reducing falls and their adverse consequences.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/groups/healthofolderpeople/projects/praised/index.aspx

ACTION (2013 - 2018; EU 7th Framework Programme). The ACTION project is investigating whether a structured Advance Care Plan (ACP) intervention (Respecting Choices) improves the quality of life and symptoms of patients with advanced lung and colorectal cancer. It involves a cluster randomised trial and linked qualitative study in six participating European countries. The study will explore the experience and impact of delivering and receiving an ACP intervention from the perspectives of patients, lay carers and health professionals.

https://www.action-acp.eu/

BOUGH (Broadening Our Understanding of Good Home care): : Defining Good Quality Home Care for People with Dementia: A Mixed-Methods Study (2015 - 2017, NIHR School for Social Care Research). BOUGH is using mixed methods, including observation, interviews, diaries, documentary analysis and medical records review to explore the nature and function of home care for persons with dementia so that its function in community support can be described, with a view to service development and effective commissioning of services.

https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/research/groups/dementia/projects/bough/index.aspx

School of Health Sciences

B236, Medical School
Queen's Medical Centre
Nottingham, NG7 2HA

telephone: +44 (0)115 95 15559
email: mhssupport@nottingham.ac.uk