Impact in Qualitative Research Blog
The QUAHRC Impact in Qualitative Research Blog aims to provide a place for the qualitative health research community showcase and reflect on the impacts and outcomes of their work. We hope this blog encourages discussion and engagement with issues of impact in qualitative applied health research.
Want to showcase your research impact? Pitch us a blog! Email quahrc@kcl.ac.uk with a short proposal. We can provide editorial support and guidance.
Nada I. J. Abualfita and Alhasan F. I. Ahmed on Ethics and Empathy in Healthcare
Dr Nada I. J. Abualfita is a medical graduate from Mansoura University, Egypt and successfully completed six months of clinical training in the Emergency Department at Mansoura University Hospitals. Dr Alhasan F. I. Ahmed graduated from Mansoura University in November 2023 and currently works as a medical trainee in the Emergency Department at Mansoura University Hospitals. In this blog, Nada I. J. Abualfita and Alhasan F. I. Ahmed reflect on how qualitative research deepens understanding of ethics and empathy in healthcare by foregrounding care experiences as meaningful evidence that informs ethical reflection and clinical practice.
Deborah Chinn on the Feeling at Home photovoice project with people with learning disabilities
Deborah Chinn is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery and Palliative Care and also works as a lead clinical psychologist in the Hackney Integrated Learning Disability Service. She uses qualitative and participatory research methods in her research with people with learning disabilities and is currently leading a project that uses conversation analysis to understand shared decision making in health care with people with learning disabilities.
Jo Law on messy, emotional and necessary ethical research with marginalised populations
Jo Law is a qualitative research assistant at the Qualitative Applied Health Research Centre at King’s College London, working on the qualitative component of the EDEN project, which examines the use of ketamine to treat depression among people with anorexia nervosa. Alongside this, she is pursuing a PhD to explore how intersecting discourses of motherhood, gender and class shape the identities and wellbeing of mothers living in precarious circumstances. In this blog, she reflects on her methodological journey, the ethical tensions of researching with vulnerable populations, and on the challenge of balancing academic expectations with her commitment to participants and social justice.
Sohail Jannesari, Tanya Krupiy and Orla Phipps on photovoice and transforming learning environments
Dr Sohail Jannesari is a Research Fellow at King’s College London and a Freelance Research Consultant. Sohail teaches at the Introduction to Qualitative Research Summer School where Dr Tanya Krupiy and Orla Phipps were students this year. The Summer School is part of the Qualitative Applied Health Research Centre (QUAHRC). In this blog, Sohail Jannesari, Tanya Krupiy and Orla Phipps reflect on how participatory and creative methods, such as photovoice, can transform learning environments, drawing on a recent exhibition at the Summer School.
Ella Parry-Davies on co-researching outcomes for domestic workers after trafficking and exploitation
Dr Ella Parry-Davies is a lecturer at King’s College London, where she works on social justice-focussed research in collaboration with experts-by-experience, primarily in the migration and anti-trafficking sectors. Taking up performance as a co-creative research method, she has worked most extensively with migrant domestic workers in the UK and Lebanon, and her book Intimate Inequalities: Performing Migrant Domestic Work is forthcoming with Northwestern University Press in September 2025. In this blog post she discusses the findings of research on the outcomes for workers who had survived trafficking and returned to the Philippines as their country of origin.
Alex Mermikides on Generating Research Impact through Arts-Based Exploration of Nursing
Dr Alex Mermikides is the D’Oyly Carte Senior Lecturer in Arts and Health in the School of Medical Education at King’s College London. Her expertise is in contemporary theatre and performance, and she is interested in how this artform can be employed as research methodology (as well as pedagogical approach) in the context of healthcare, illness and disability. In this blog post, Alex outlines a project she conducted before coming to King’s, which involved making a performance about nursing. Unexpectedly, the project was submitted as an Impact Case Study in the 2021 Research Excellence Framework, achieving a 4* rating. Here she describes how this came about and shares some tips on maximising impact in the run up to REF 29.
Sharli Paphitis and Sohail Jannesari on prioritising the voices of human trafficking survivors to develop a holistic approach to recovery
Dr Sharli Paphitis is a Senior Research Fellow in Qualitative Research at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience at King’s College London. Her interdisciplinary research focuses on epistemic justice, mental health, and community-based participatory methods. Dr Sohail Jannesari is a Research Fellow at King’s College London and a Senior Teaching Fellow at Imperial College London. His research focuses on migration and mental health, outcomes for survivors of human trafficking, creative, participatory and decolonial methods, equitable knowledge production, and research ethics. In this blog, they discuss the importance of prioritising the voices of human trafficking survivors to develop a holistic approach to recovery.
Caroline Lawlor on developing the Managing Emotions Group
Dr Caroline Lawlor is a Senior Clinical Psychologist at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and a Research Affiliate at King’s College London. In this blog she writes about the role of qualitative work in developing a new group therapy supporting to help people with psychosis manage their emotions.
Bringing research to life – creating impact case study videos of co-design
Dr Lili Golmohammadi and Emelia Delaney are Research Associates at King’s College London, working on the King’s Health Partners Digital Health Hub and co-design for digital health innovation. Paul Lennon is a Lived Experience Contributor and Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement Member, who has supported a number of projects at King’s College London, including the SURE Recovery App, which aids the process of recovery from addiction. In this blog they discuss the process of communicating stories of co-design in an engaging format for the development of an open-access Co-design for digital health course and methods library.
Phoebe Martin on exploring campus sexual harassment
Dr Phoebe Martin is a Research Associate at King’s College London working on the project ‘Visual and Embodied Methodologies for Addressing Gender Based Violence’. Her research looks at the intersections of art and feminist activism. In this blog she discusses a series of Photovoice workshops exploring the idea of safety in relation to sexual harassment on campus.
Nat Gohlan on power dynamics in co-production
Nat Gohlan is the Participatory Research Coordinator at King’s College London, working to embed a culture of co-produced and collaborative research with communities. In this blog, Nat shares insights and reflections from a recent training session – Power Dynamics in Co-Produced Research – which they ran with Voices That Shake!.