SUMMER 2019 | ISSUE ONE
Pg 4 WATERSPOUTT - providing safe drinking water to local communities
Inside this edition Pg 3
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Socio-economic valuation of climate impact
Detecting change in complex ecological communities
MedTech super connector programme
Welcome Research Notes is an important element of the strategic realignment of research and knowledge exchange within the University
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am delighted to welcome you to this inaugural edition of Research Notes.
We are a teachingfocused institution for whom students will always be at the heart of what we do. But we recognise the tremendous value brought to our community and to our University by our work in research, knowledge exchange, enterprise, impact and of course postgraduate supervision. These activities enrich the University’s intellectual life and help us secure the engagement of our communities, the public, and our key strategic partners. They help us to innovate and continually improve our enquirybased education. Over the next three years we will work collectively to ensure we deliver on the promises contained in Impact 2022, our new University strategic plan. We will ensure that research is organised around impact, to maximise benefit for the users of our research. We will adopt an inclusive approach, encouraging contributions from all staff and students to our wide range of
research and knowledge exchange activities. As we develop research strength, we will build our reputation and reinforce our preeminence within key disciplines and position the University to attain research degree awarding powers. Research Notes is an important element of the strategic realignment of research and knowledge exchange within the University. It is a means for us to communicate about our research activity, encourage others to get involved, and celebrate our successes. Perhaps above all I hope it will start conversations, for it is in those conversations that we find the next interesting idea, identify connections we otherwise would not make, and begin to understand and cherish anew all that is wonderful about the University. Finally, I would like to thank all those whose work has turned the vision for Research Notes into a reality – Professor Florin Ioras for his leadership of research and enterprise, all in the RED team, and of course all the staff and students whose activity in research, knowledge exchange, enterprise and impact adds so much to our community and to the vibrancy of the University. With all good wishes,
Professor Nick Braisby Vice-Chancellor
PROFESSOR NICK BRAISBY, Vice-Chancellor
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Socio-economic valuation of climate impact chains and decarbonisation pathways in European islands
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OCLIMPACT is a 4.5 million innovation action project funded by the EU Horizon 2020 scheme, as part of the decarbonisation portfolio. SOCLIMPACT models climate change effects and their socioeconomic impacts in European islands for 2030–2100. Decarbonisation is the reduction or removal of greenhouse gas emissions from energy sources. Smaller communities in European islands are more vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The project aims to develop climate projections, assessing impact, risk and vulnerability to the island communities. The project examines how European islands and archipelagos can flourish economically alongside the EU’s Blue Growth strategy for sustainable progress in the marine and maritime sectors. It is also looking at how economies will grow as decarbonisation develops, focusing on the Baltic islands, Malta, Sardinia, Madeira, Cyprus, Sicily, Crete, Corsica, Canary Islands, Balearic Islands and the Azores.
SOCLIMPACT is led by the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and includes partners from Spain, Germany, the West Indies, France, Portugal, Cyprus, Greece, Italy, and Malta, with representatives from the 12 EU islands and archipelagos. These representatives are experts and economic agents from the fields of maritime transport, fishing, aquaculture and tourism. Professor Florin Ioras, Director of Research and Enterprise, is leading the Bucks New University team alongside Research Fellow Dr Ioan Dutcă and Research Associate Dr Indrachapa Bandara. The project started in October 2017 and will continue for four years, completing in August 2021. Further information is available on the project website soclimpact.org with news and recent developments @soclimpact on Twitter.
Horizon 2020 Horizon 2020 is the biggest EU Research and Innovation programme with nearly €80 billion of funding available over 7 years (2014 to 2020). The scheme couples research and innovation, focusing on excellent science, industrial leadership and tackling societal challenges. ….and Brexit? Access to future EU funding for UK HEIs will depend on the Brexit deal. In the event of ‘nodeal’, UK partners may still be able to access funding in some schemes as a ‘third country’.
Professor Florin Ioras Director of Research and Enterprise
INCAMP Carbon neutral management of sport marinas International masters modules programme Funded by the Erasmus+ Capacity Building in Higher Education programme, INCAMP will develop an International Masters Module programme for the Carbon Neutral Management of Sport Marinas. INCAMP aims to trigger modernisation and reinforce education aligned to the needs and opportunities offered by traditional industries. It will provide, assess, and look for the recognition of basic skills needed in carbon management, waste and energy management, transport and logistics management. These skills will include entrepreneurship, foreign languages and digital competences. Professor Florin Ioras co-ordinates this project with Bucks New University as lead partner, with partners in Spain, Portugal, Cyprus, Romania and Italy. INCAMP project meeting at Bucks. (PROF FLORIN IORAS second from left)
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Transparent jerry can for SODIS
Water sustainable point of use treatment technologies Product design lecturer DR LYNDON BUCK and PhD student RICHARD HARLOW are supporting the design element of the project, with DR GEORGE CLERK supporting the social science programme.
F The WATERSPOUTT consortium is led by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, with 18 partners from the UK, Malawi, Uganda, South Africa, Ethiopia, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Turkey, Ireland, Netherlands and Austria. The project started in June 2016 and is due to complete in 2020. Further information is available on the WATERSPOUTT project website: waterspoutt.eu. Project news and recent developments can be found by following @waterspoutt_eu on Twitter.
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unded by the EU Horizon 2020 scheme, WATERSPOUTT aims to provide safe drinking water to communities who rely on unsafe sources. The consortium is carrying out a technological development programme to advance three applications based on Solar Disinfection (SODIS), which can make water safe to drink after it has been collected.
SODIS is an affordable household water treatment that uses sunlight to kill harmful microbes and provides safe drinking water to remote communities that rely on unsafe sources throughout the Sub-Saharan African Continent and other resourcepoor countries. In this project, use of the technology is examined in four chosen research sites in Malawi, Ethiopia, South Africa and Uganda.
In parallel, a social science programme has been structured to make sure that the technologies are adopted by the target communities in rural Africa, with the support of the local authorities and in an economically sustainable way.
The novel SODIS technologies are systems for use with domestic and community harvested rainwater, transparent SODIS 20L jerry cans and combined SODIS/ ceramic pot filtration systems. These are commercialisable technologies which will create employment and economic benefits for citizens in both the EU and resourcepoor nations.
The WHO and UNICEF estimate that nearly 660 million people around the world do not have reliable access to safe drinking water. Half of these people live in sub-Saharan Africa, in rural areas which will remain unconnected to any municipal piped water supply for the foreseeable future. Entire communities obtain drinking water from unsafe sources (for example, untreated surface water) and are continuously at risk of contracting disease through exposure to waterborne pathogens and, in particular, faecal pathogens.
The overall aim and impact is to transform access to safe drinking water through integrated social sciences, education and solar technologies. The project aims align with The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number six which aims at achieving universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all by 2030.
Photo-irradiation and absorption based novel innovations for water-treatment Product design lecturer DR LYNDON BUCK and PhD student PAUL RUSSELL are supporting the design element of the project.
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ANIWATER is a fouryear project funded by the Horizon 2020 EU – India joint call on Research and Innovation for water. The project aims to increase the availability of drinking water using treated waste water in peri-urban and rural Indian communities. The PANIWATER consortium consists of 18 worldwide and European partners that are working to develop six prototypes to remove contaminates from waste water and drinking water. These will then be trialled in research sites in India. Initial successes with the WATERSPOUTT project, and overlap in consortia partners supported the successful funding of this project, with the PANIWATER consortium also led by the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.
An objective of the EU WATERSPOUTT project was to develop a 20L Transparent Jerry can for solar disinfection (SODIS) purposes. The project demonstrated that the optimum material for its manufacture is polypropylene (PP). However, they were unable to source a manufacturer in Europe or Africa who could produce them from that material. The PANIWATER project includes funding for the manufacture and evaluation of polypropylene Transparent Jerry cans in India. Almost every household without access to safe water in low-income countries has a jerry can. If this project is successful it has the potential to replace all of these with polypropylene Transparent Jerry cans which will provide safe drinking water for the most vulnerable communities across the globe.
Follow project updates on twitter at @paniwater_eu
According to the WHO and UNICEF, in 2017 2.1 billion people are without access to a safely managed source of water, 844 million people still lack even a basic drinking water service and 159 million people collect drinking water directly from surface water sources.
The PANIWATER consortium kick-off meeting in New Delhi India, February 2019. (DR LYNDON BUCK second from left).
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Detecting change in complex ecological communities
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unded by the Australian Coal Association Research Program (ACARP), this project aims to develop Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) image capture and data analysis processes to monitor change in biologically valuable and sensitive communities. The target vegetation communities are biodiverse wetlands in New South Wales, Australia. These are vulnerable to disturbance from water table changes, fire and other anthropogenic activities. The rationale for using Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology is that this provides an accessible means for capturing high resolution imagery at frequent intervals so that swamp environments may be monitored more effectively, enabling timely remedial intervention. More than 500 GB of visible spectrum, red-edge and Near Infrared (NIR) image data has been captured at high resolution as 3D-point clouds over three swamps at different times
of the day with three camera types during summer and winter seasons of 2017-19. The significance of UAV image data is that, unlike conventional aerial and satellite survey, it provides opportunities for building 3D models of vegetation structure. This allows more accurate differentiation of ground flora, shrub and canopy layer vegetation communities. Much of the work so far has been concerned with optimizing methodology. This work challenges widely accepted use of standardized parameters for processing UAV data by demonstrating that resulting measurements may not be reliable or repeatable. Key outputs for this project include: (1) research informed guidelines for optimized use of spectral bands, illumination conditions at different times of day (figure 1) and calibration settings for repeatable UAV survey; (2) a two-to-threefold improvement in boundary mapping of target communities using UAV point clouds;
(3) highly reproducible spatial mapping of tree/vegetation canopy; (4) findings that Red Edge and NIR imagery reconstructed tree canopies more effectively than visible wavelengths while red spectral band imagery reconstructed ground and tree trunk/branch features; (5) outline procedures for industry compliance survey and environmental monitoring; (6) a suite of machine learning classification algorithms including proprietary (ArcGIS) and open source (R-GDAL) software workflow tools using conventional and Machine Learning approaches; (7) the capability to detect change in vegetation cover and tree growth between years at the level of individual canopies (Figure 2). The project is conducted by Dr Richard Mather in partnership with Dr Andrew Fletcher from Queensland University of Technology.
FIG. 2 Reporting change for a Swamp community (Feb 2018 - Feb 2019). Notes: (i) change detection is conducted in 6 categories; 4 with no change and 2 indicating growth/increases in canopy and in areas without vegetation signal (pink and red respectively); (ii) change detection map algebra may be modified to target other surface types, including water bodies.
FIG. 1. Top: False colour orthomosaic for UGG community. Bottom: Digital surface models for products produced from morning (red), midday (green) and afternoon (blue) survey flights shown. Areas in uniform white to grey are consistently modelled at all times. Features that are blue were present in afternoon imagery but not in morning or midday surveys
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The AHRC-FUNDED RITUAL RECONSTRUCTED PROJECT was a collaborative project working with film, performance, installation and storytelling to explore the ways in which Jewish people who identify as LGBTQI engage in religious and community life.
Leveraging good practice and policy engagement to enhance social inclusion
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rofessor Margaret Greenfields has conducted a wide range of research which focuses on enhancing social inclusion for communities at risk of marginalisation, or groups whose voices may not be widely heard in public discourse.
Much of her work has engaged with the health and wellbeing of Gypsy, Traveller and Roma populations in the UK as well as engagement with broader European policy impacting those communities. In addition, an AHRC-funded project focused on the interplay between LGBT+ identities, faith identity, ritual practice, mental health and wellbeing and personal migration histories.
Her research and practice focuses on the co-production of knowledge and the development of policy recommendations through partnership working with community members and civil society agencies.
Another project, ‘Abused no More: The Voices of Refugee and Asylum-seeking Women’, entailed working with Refugee women to develop a toolkit to support them in discussing gender violence and how this impacts on asylum claims.
Work in these areas has been recognised at local, national and EU policy levels as relevant to identifying and engaging with key health and wellbeing inequalities for populations with intersectional characteristics which place them at risk of exclusion. Policy and practice recommendations have had leverage in terms of impacting changes in professional guidance and practice. This included a 2018 House of Lords debate which drew upon work with the Traveller Movement on behalf of the National Health Inclusion Board and Department of Health.
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Medtech Superconnector Challenge Accelerator programme Margaret Rioga gives her insight into taking part
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have had the pleasure of being approved to take part in the Medtech Superconnector programme for Cohort 2.
GRETA PAA-KERNER at a MedTech SuperConnector event
Medtech super connector programme
Nurturing talent, ideas and entrpreneurship Bucks New University is part of a consortium of eight higher education institutions that are tackling challenges in the MedTech SuperConnector programme. Led by Imperial College London, the MedTech SuperConnector is an open experiment in medical technology acceleration, combining academic technology transfer offices, science business incubators, industry expertise, NHS patients and other enabling partners. Applicants are academics or PhD/ Masters students who want to access dedicated prototyping and facilities to make an impact on mental health, well-being and happiness. The programme runs 6 incubator programmes to determine the most effective methods for the translation
of discoveries into clinical practice and consumer use. Two programmes run per year over three years, alternating between technology and challenge-led accelerators. MedTech Super Connector is funded by Research England through their Connecting Capabilities Fund. The project forms part of the UK Industrial Strategy to boost new business innovations and translate research into commercialisation to rapidly translate new medical technologies into clinical solutions to help change lives. If you would like to apply or find out more contact Greta.Paa-Kerner@bucks.ac.uk medtechsuperconnector.com
Members are: Bucks New Uni, Imperial College, Queen Mary Uni, Royal College of Art, Royal College of Music, Royal Veterinary College, The Francis Crick Institute and The Institute of Cancer Research
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The Medtech Superconnector Challenge Accelerator programme is a 6-month programme which supports academics to work as part of a team to develop early stage medical technology concepts and technologies. The theme for this year was ‘mental health and promoting wellbeing and happiness’. As a Mental Health and Positive Psychology professional, this theme appealed to me. To apply, I completed an online form and was then invited to attend a 2-day innovation lab hackathon. This involved forming teams to share and develop ideas to present to a panel of judges. Through our success in the hackathon, my project partner and I are looking to develop digital solutions to promote healthy use of social media and together we have been awarded a budget of ÂŁ60,000 to achieve this. In addition to the budget to develop your product, you attend training and coaching sessions which all go to providing you with the skills and knowledge to develop a viable and successful product. It has been an amazing experience where I have learned a lot about product design and market research and along the way met a range of professionals making the whole experience very enriching and innovative. The next cohort will be starting soon and I would recommend the experience if you are creative and want to do something dynamic which contributes to enhancing healthcare.
MARGARET RIOGA Associate Head of School in Nursing and Allied Health
New funding awards Woodlanders’ Lives and Landscapes Chalk: Cherries and Chairs Landscape partnership scheme
Mental health and analytics: a continuum approach to understanding and improving student mental health.
Led by the Chiltern Conservation Board, the Chalk, Cherries and Chairs landscape partnership is funded by Heritage Lottery Funding. As part of this scheme, Dr Helena Chance is leading the “Woodlanders Lives and Landscapes.” project at Bucks.
Led by the University of Northumbria, this project is funded by the Office for Students as part of their Challenge Competition: “Achieving a step change in mental health outcomes for all students.”
The project will capture memories to understand more about domestic and social lives, homes and gardens, networks, social and sporting activities, health, politics, experiences of war, dialects, traditions, songs, games, food, clothes, religion and education. The project will discover how these people’s lives and work shaped today’s landscape and how the landscape shaped them. The project will be delivered by local volunteers, under the guidance of Dr Helena Chance, historian of industrial landscapes.
The project aims to improve mental health and learning outcomes for all students, match students in need to appropriate health and wellbeing support, and reduce student suicide. These aims will be achieved by the innovative integration of technology, advanced educational data analytics, student relationship management, and effective models of support. The project is a collaboration between sector leading universities and technology companies, students, a mental health charity and sector representative organisations. Professor Julie McLeod leads Bucks role in this project.
New PhD Awards
Conferences 12th Annual University of Glasgow Learning and Teaching Conference In April, Rebecca Rochon presented research outcomes from her Professional Doctorate research at the University of Glasgow. Her presentation title was “Assessment and learning gain: are we measuring what’s important to students?”
BEAST Feast 2019 In May, Dr Gerard Gormley presented his music composition research, called ‘Odessa’ at the BEAST feast event held in Birmingham. BEAST (Birmingham ElectroAcoustic Sound Theatre) is the concert sound system of the University of Birmingham’s Electroacoustic Music Studios. Their annual BEAST FEaST event includes a range of concerns, presentations and installations for electroacoustic music.
Congratulations to Dr Niamh Morrin for completing her Doctorate at Bucks, supervised by Dr Keiran Henderson and Dr Ian Swaine (from University of Greenwich). Niamh’s thesis “The development of a selfregulated isometric handgrip training protocol and its effects on blood pressure (resting and ambulatory), markers of autonomic function and adherence in pre-hypertensive and stage 1 hypertensive adults (≥55years).” is now available on the repository: bucks.collections.crest. ac.uk/17771 and congratulations to Dr Sua Lee, who has also completed her Doctorate supervised by Dr Lyndon Buck and Professor Florin Ioras. Sua’s thesis “Sustainable Design Approaches Using Waste Furniture Materials for Design partners” is available on the repository here bucks.collections.crest.ac.uk/17797.
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Bucks Events 5th Annual Applied Positive Psychology Symposium
BUCKS RESEARCH STUDENT CONFERENCE
Saturday 1 June 2019
Friday 28 June 2019
Each year, Bucks Positive Psychology Research Group holds an Applied Positive Psychology Symposium. The day is held in partnership with the other UK universities that provide a Masters in Applied Positive Psychology (MAPP) programmes (Anglia Ruskin University and the University of East London) with contributions from other positive psychology researchers from organisations including the University of Northampton, University of Buckingham, University College Cork, Goldsmiths, and the Positive Psychology People/Positive Psychology Learning.
Our Summer event included updates on research progress from students in Design, Psychology and Nursing:
The research group consists of the MAPP lecturers: Drs Matthew Smith, Piers Worth, Genevieve Cseh, and Ceri Sims. Further details of their research and events can be found at: bucks.ac.uk/research/ research-at-bucks/psychology.
We also welcomed Drs Mathew Smith and Piers Worth who talked about supporting the mental health and wellbeing of research students in their talk: “The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Researcher: Managing Wellbeing During a PhD”. Our next research student conference is taking place on Friday 22 November.
Proceedings from this and previous symposia can be found on the repository: bucks.collections. crest.ac.uk/17819.
Paul Russell “Design Innovation for Poverty Alleviation” Ruth Howard “Autistic Development Theory: A New Model to Understand Autistic Development” Marina Nicholas “To Explore the ‘Lived Experiences’ of Patients Who Have Had a Heart Attack and PPCI a Qualitative Study”
Bucks research needs you Faciometrics study Dr Julia Robertson and Dr Barbara Kingsley are investigating how people use restricted information in terms of facial image alone in order to make stereotypical assumptions about another’s personality. Anyone 18 or over can take part in this research. All participation is entirely voluntary and takes 15-20 minutes (at the most) to complete a survey. Further details about their research can be found at: bucks.ac.uk/research/research-at-bucks/ psychology.
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The career and life narratives of academics in the UK Dr Sena Agbo-Quaye and Dr Cheryl Pitt are investigating the career stories of university academic staff. The aim is to gain a better understanding of the career development, occupational decision making and life journeys of academics. They are looking for more participants who are academics with at least 12 months lecturing experience at higher education level and are 30 years of age or over. If you’re interested in taking part, please contact sena.quaye@bucks.ac.uk.
New publications Further details of all our publications can be found on Bucks repository: bucks.collections. crest.ac.uk
ANSBRO, MARIA (2019) A qualitative examination of attachment based concepts in probation supervision. Probation Journal. Avgeli, Vasiliki, BAKIR, ALI and Wickens, Eugenia (2019) Mountainous tourism development in Crete: Local perspective. Journal On Tourism & Sustainability. Polo-López, M. Inmaculada, Martínez-García, Azahara, Abeledo-Lameiro, Maria Jesus, H. Gómez-Couso, Hipolito, E. Ares-Mazás, Elvira, Reboredo-Fernández, Aurora, Morse, Tracy D., BUCK, LYNDON, Lungu, Kingsley, McGuigan, Kevin G. and Fernández-Ibáñez, Pilar (2019) Microbiological Evaluation of 5 L- and 20 L-Transparent Polypropylene Buckets for Solar Water Disinfection (SODIS). Molecules. CHANCE, HELENA and Rajguru, Megha (2019) The Didactic Landscape. Studies in the History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes Special Issue. GREENFIELDS, MARGARET and Smith, David (2019) “NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN”: Romany Gypsies, Travellers and their entwined historical relationships with workingclass London communities. International Journal of Roma Studies
Halalisan, Aureliu Florin, Popa, B, Heras-Saizarbitoria, I, IORAS, FLORIN and Abrudan, I. (2019) Drivers, perceived benefits and impacts of FSC chain of custody certification in a challenging sectoral context: the case of Romania. International Forestry Review. Short, Maria, LEET, SRIKARTINI, and Kalpaxi, Elisavet (2019) Context and Narrative in Photography. Creative Photography Series. Bloomsbury Publishing Ltd. Ramluggun, Pras, NATHOO, SANJ, Jackson, Debra and Usher, Kim (2019) Does compassion matter in custodial care? International Journal of Mental Health Nursing. NEVIN, JONPAUL (2019) Auto-Regulated Resistance Training. Does VelocityBased Training Represent the Future? Strength and Conditioning Journal. Thompson, Kristin P.J, O’KEEFFE, CIARAN, CSEH, GENEVIEVE M., WORTH, PIERS AND SMITH, MATTHEW D. (2019) Escaping Plato’s Cave: Ethical considerations for the use of Virtual Reality in psychology teaching. IM Publications Open.
PROCTER, SUSAN, Ooi, MuiKeow, Hopkins, Charlotte and Moore, Geraldine (2019) A review of the literature on family decision-making at end of life precipitating hospital admission. British Journal of Nursing. Iordanova, Elitza and STAINTON, HAYLEY (2019) Cognition, emotion and trust: A comparative analysis of Cambodia’s perceived and projected online image. Tourist Studies. TEDMAN, ALISON (2019) They stay because of all the things they can be”: Avatars as Fans in a Virtual Future. Fantastika Journal. Cook, Neal, Braine, Mary E. and TROUT, RUTH (2019) Nurses’ understanding and experience of applying painful stimuli when assessing components of the Glasgow Coma Scale. Journal of Clinical Nursing. ISSN 1365-2702 Edwards, Sharon L, WILLIAMS, JOYCE, AND LEE, MANDY (2019) Reducing drug errors by engaging student nurses in medication management simulation. Journal of Prescribing Practice Davidson, Anna and WILLIAMS, JULIA (2019) Factors affecting quality of life in patients experiencing facial disfigurement due to surgery for head and neck cancer. British Journal of Nursing.
Research Notes is produced by the Research and Enterprise Development Unit (RED Unit) at Buckinghamshire New University. Please direct responses to any of the articles within this issue of Research Notes to email ResearchUnit@bucks.ac.uk or contact tel: 01494 522 141 ext. 4008. All items are accurate at the time of going to press. This publication is available in alternative formats if required.
© Buckinghamshire New University 2019
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bucks.ac.uk SUMMER 2019 | ISSUE ONE