Living Well Oxford
Sustainable healthcare in the 21st century requires the spread of innovation: finding new and better ways of doing things and doing things that we know to work. This means not only new drugs, devices and diagnostics, but also new ways of involving the public: learning from them and helping them understand health and illness, manage their own health and access care when they need it.
As the number of patients with multiple, long-term conditions increases so does the need to improve knowledge and behaviours in the population and to transform the nature of their interaction with the clinicians and the systems caring for them. We need innovation in education for doctors and nurses. We need innovation in the way in which we design health and social care systems. We need truly personalised care and person-centred organisations.
The Oxford Trust is supporting a project called Living Well Oxford – a collaborative public engagement project between the Oxford Academic Health Science Network, Science Oxford and the Oxford Health Experiences Institute to support the exploration and understanding of health and healthcare.
The project is being managed by Dr Kate Castleden, who is is co-ordinating a pilot to develop and evaluate activities and events which will build expertise and evidence for a longer term larger-scale project. Living Well will run initially in Oxford and explore what the concept of ‘living well’ means, drawing on areas that have significant public health impact, public interest and local research expertise, such as weight, diet and health, and ageing and dementia.
You can find out more about Living Well Oxford here.
Living Well Oxford has worked with a number of partners to deliver the following:
- A debate about genome data privacy, funded by the British Science Association
- A stroke storytelling event at The Story Museum, part of Oxfordshire Science Festival (OSF)
- A stroke-themed stall at Health Day at Templars Square Shopping Centre, part of OSF
- A health-themed session at children’s summer holiday clubs in East Oxford and Rose Hill
Living Well Oxford has recently secured a grant from the Wellcome Trust – the Wellcome People Award – to fund a “pop-up shop” entitled “Ageing: From Birth and Beyond”, which will be held in Templars Square Shopping Centre in May 2017. This will aim to:
- Work with seldom-heard communities to inform activity development
- Work with researchers to provide opportunities for public engagement and build capacity
For more information about the “pop-up shop”, take a look here: Living Well Oxford Blog
If you would like to get involved, a summary of the shop can be found here Living Well Oxford Pop Up Shop Summary, and an expression of interest form here Pop Up Shop Expression of Interest Form.
Funded by a Wellcome People Award
