Healthy Families

The Healthy Families theme of the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration Yorkshire and Humber works with the public, service providers and researchers to improve health, wellbeing and promote fairer futures for families living in deprived areas across the Yorkshire and Humber region. The theme is co-led by Professor Rosie McEachan and Dr Sunil Bhopal and  builds upon the foundations established by the previous Collaborations for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (CLAHRCs).

Research is undertaken across three broad topic areas:

  • Pregnancy and Early Years
  • Adolescence and Youth
  • Healthy, Sustainable Environments

 

Healthy Families research projects which were established in 2020 to understand the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic can be found on the COVID-19 page.  We have over 50 research projects in our theme and are always interested in hearing new ideas – please do get in touch. Explore the topic areas below to find out more about our current projects.

Healthy Families Projects

10 Year PlanHealthy Families

BABI-RSV: Evaluating RSV Immunity Based on Prematurity and Maternal Vaccine Timing

BackgroundRespiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is one of the leading causes of hospital admission in young infants. In September 2024, the UK introduced a maternal RSV vaccination programme to help protect...

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Healthy Families

Co-designing an Equitable Service Model for Nature-Based Approaches in Specialist Perinatal Mental Health Services (Nests)

BackgroundMental health difficulties affect up to one in four women during pregnancy and after birth. Specialist Perinatal Mental Health (SPMH) services are increasingly offering nature-based activities such as walking groups,...

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Healthy Families

Making Research Everybody’s Business

Making Research Everybody’s Business: Developing and Assessing the Feasibility of a Behavioural Intervention to Increase Research Engagement in Children and Young People’s Mental Health Services BackgroundResearch-active healthcare organisations achieve better...

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Making a Difference: Our Latest Healthy Families case studies

Healthy FamiliesKnowledge Mobilisation & Implementation

IMPACT SNAPSHOT:From Research to Reform — How NIHR ARC Yorkshire & Humber helped inform School White Paper

Why This Matters The impact of YH ARC research extends far beyond academic journals. By embedding researchers in policy processes — and by producing evidence that speaks directly to the decisions policymakers face — we have contributed to the policy that will affect the lives of over 1.7 million children with SEND in schools across the country

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Healthy FamiliesKnowledge Mobilisation & Implementation

IMPACT SNAPSHOT:From Research to Reform — How NIHR ARC Yorkshire & Humber helped inform School White Paper

Why This Matters The impact of YH ARC research extends far beyond academic journals. By embedding researchers in policy processes — and by producing evidence that speaks directly to the decisions policymakers face — we have contributed to the policy that will affect the lives of over 1.7 million children with SEND in schools across the country

Read more

10 Year PlanHealthy FamiliesKnowledge Mobilisation & Implementation

IMPACT SNAPSHOT: Maternal Enhanced and Critical Care (MEaCC) Project

We established the first comprehensive regional database of maternal care emergencies, revealing that 58% of women requiring enhanced care had no pre-existing conditions.

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10 Year PlanHealthy FamiliesKnowledge Mobilisation & Implementation

IMPACT SNAPSHOT: Maternal Enhanced and Critical Care (MEaCC) Project

We established the first comprehensive regional database of maternal care emergencies, revealing that 58% of women requiring enhanced care had no pre-existing conditions.

Read more

10 Year PlanHealthy Families

IMPACT SNAPSHOT: Child of the North and Centre for Applied Educational Research

We connected health services with educational settings to address stark regional inequalities, producing 12 evidence-based reports that influenced national policy.

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10 Year PlanHealthy Families

IMPACT SNAPSHOT: Child of the North and Centre for Applied Educational Research

We connected health services with educational settings to address stark regional inequalities, producing 12 evidence-based reports that influenced national policy.

Read more

Meet the Healthy Families Team

Louise Hussey

Senior Research Fellow and Research Lead

Healthy Families

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Dr Sunil Bhopal

Theme Co-Lead

Healthy Families

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Josie Dickerson

Director – Better Start Bradford Innovation Hub and Bradford Inequalities Research Unit

Healthy Families

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Our latest Healthy Families publications

Healthy Families

Birth Weight Percentiles and Infant and Child Growth Dynamics

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Healthy Families

An assessment of residence scale residential PM2.5 exposure inaccuracy with a measurement-constrained theoretical model approach

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Healthy Families

A longitudinal cohort study of damp and mouldy housing and children’s respiratory health in Bradford, UK

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View our sub-themes

Healthy Places

The Healthy Places topic seeks to understand how our environments can impact on our health. We use a range of methods from engagement and citizen science projects with our children, families, and communities, to collecting and analysing environmental and health data and evaluating interventions.

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Healthy Schools

The Healthy Schools topic seeks to develop interventions and methods to improve mental and physical health in schools through across sector collaborations with health and educational professionals.

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Oral Health

The Oral Health topic aims to improve children's oral health by researching and implementing evidence-based oral health promotion across early years services.

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Systems Change

The cross cutting Systems Change topic helps to establish and harness linked routine data to plan and evaluate services, facilitate collaboration, and integrate services across health, social care, education and community settings.

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Healthy Bodies and Minds

The Healthy Bodies and Minds topic aims to co-produce scalable community and system interventions to tackle the child and family obesity crisis. It seeks to support the optimum physical health of children and families including prevention of obesity.

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Best Start

The Best Start topic aims to improve the mental and physical health of parents and infants from conception onwards. This includes developing and evaluating interventions, co-producing and testing measures, and promoting equitable access to support for families.

Theme lead(s): Sarah Blower

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