PHIRST Elevate

PHIRST Elevate is based between the University of Edinburgh and Ulster University. It is led by Professor Marie Murphy and Dr Paul Kelly and brings together researchers from four specialist research centres:

The Physical Activity for Health Research Centre, University of Edinburgh
The Scottish Collaboration for Public Health Research and Policy, University of Edinburgh
University of Edinburgh Business School
Centre for Exercise Medicine, Physical Activity and Health, Ulster University

The grouping has an established track record of evaluative research. Members have a range of expertise covering a range of public health topics:

increasing physical activity and exercise
improving diet and nutrition
enhancing public transport
providing better health services and housing
education
community policing
homelessness support
parent and family support
access and use of urban green and blues spaces (e.g. parks and rivers).

Our approach is to include those developing, delivering and affected by the interventions we are evaluating. Our evaluation process has six stages that starts with initial contact and ends with reporting results to a range of audiences. From this strong base our team can be flexible, adaptive, and responsive to the specifics of the project and the needs of stakeholders.

Each Elevate project will include a member of staff from the Local Government organisation running the intervention. There will be a Community Stakeholder Group to guide the research and the sharing of findings. Membership will comprise the local community receiving the intervention, such as members of the public or service users, representatives from Local Government, and other key stakeholders. We are committed to making sure that our evaluation findings are useful to Local Government and their communities.

Evaluations

Elevate members

Key contact(s)
sarah.janac@ed.ac.uk,