Abstract

The NIHR School for Social Care Research aims to improve the evidence base for adult social care practice in England through commissioning world-class research. Research proposals to the School have to demonstrate the potential for impact on practice. As the School has just entered a second five-year phase, studies from Phase 1 are only just reporting and unlikely to have had significant impact at this stage. Nevertheless, in order to assess the impact of commissioned research projects, the School – in partnership with the Personal Social Services Research Unit at LSE – is undertaking a programme of work to evaluate different approaches to impact assessment and applicability to social care research.

This presentation will explore impact assessment methods and possible relevance to long-term care research, discuss initial findings from bibliometrics analysis and the feasibility of assessing the economic returns from social care research, and reflect on lessons for long-term care research arising from the School’s activities thus far.

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