Amanda Clarke

Amanda Clarke, Professor of Nursing, Northumbria University
Email: Amanda.clarke@northumbria.ac.uk

Committee member of the RCN Northern Region RCN Research Society

Background

I entered academia as a mature student, having worked as a nursing sister on medical/stroke rehabilitation units for older adults for a number of years.  I read Sociology and Politics at the University of Sheffield, followed by a Master’s in Applied Research and Quality Evaluation.  I then completed my Doctorate in Sociology whilst working part-time as a Research Assistant at Sheffield School of Nursing. Prior to coming to Northumbria, I worked as a Lecturer/Senior Lecturer in the School of Nursing and Midwifery and the School of Health and Related Research at the University of Sheffield and, latterly, the University of Aberdeen in the Centre of Academic Primary Care. 

Current role

I took up my present post at Northumbria in November 2011. I am involved with several research projects the main one being with colleagues from the universities of Dundee, Aberdeen, Greenwich and Teesside, in the Medical Research Council and Cross-Research funded study ‘Engaging with Older People and their Carers to Develop and Deliver Interventions for the Self-management of Chronic Pain’ (EOPIC). This is part of the Livelong Health and Wellbeing programme. I am supporting colleagues at Northumbria with several smaller studies, including an Independent Evaluation of the County Durham and Darlington Macmillan Cancer Services ‘Macmillan Palliative Care Discharge Facilitators’. Commencing in June 2012, I am working with a multi-disciplinary team from the University of Aberdeen on a Chief Scientist Office funded study ‘Ways to Intervene and Support Engagement of Older adults Weight Loss Study’ (WISE OWLS).

Research interests

Methodological concerns and ways of working with older adults

This includes engaging in life story work with older adults; developing more participatory and innovative ways of working with older adults as research participants, service users, co-researchers and peer educators. I am particularly interested in the ways that life story and narrative work may be utilised to gain a more rounded understanding of service users' experiences and needs from a research, policy and practice perspective.

Active ageing in the context of older adult’s everyday lives, especially those with long-term conditions and at the end of life

My research contributes to enhancing understandings of the experiences and perceptions of adults in later life and developing ways to offer older adults education, information and support in the management of health and when thinking about and planning for the end of their lives. Theoretical perspectives include approaches to health care in later life, which are centred on the individual’s needs and life course perspectives, investigating ways to enhance person-centred and relationship-centred care in clinical practice and developing the concept of active ageing to capture a broader and more rounded interpretation set in the context of ‘ordinary’ older adult’s lives.  

Institutional biography: http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/sches/research/ches/ageingstudies/staffprofiles/amanda_clarke/