Circumventing Social Desirability Response Bias in Personal Interview Surveys

Exploration of the views and experiences of research healthcare professionals during their redeployment to clinical roles during the COVID-19 pandemic

Aim

This study aimed to explore the views and experiences of research healthcare professionals towards their redeployment to frontline clinical roles during the COVID‐19 pandemic.

Background

Healthcare professionals working in research were redeployed during the COVID‐19 pandemic to support the delivery of clinical services across the National Health Service. They are experienced clinicians with research knowledge and skills, and specific working patterns. It is important to understand how these professionals were used and supported during their transition to clinical roles during the pandemic.

Method

Between July and September 2020, 15 research healthcare professionals were recruited into this qualitative study. Each participant completed a single semi‐structured interview lasting approximately 30–60 min, conducted remotely using a teleconferencing platform. Interviews were transcribed verbatim, and data analysed by the process of inductive thematic analysis with the assistance of NVivo 12.06 (Nov, 2019).

Findings

Four main themes were identified from analysis of the transcripts: (a) initial personal response to the pandemic (subthemes: of anxieties due to unknown disease impact and concern for others); (b) mobilization for clinical redeployment (subthemes: motivations for voluntary redeployment, the professional challenges, personal fears and the organization and preparedness for redeployment); (c) adaptive deployment to clinical roles (subthemes: adapting to new roles and responsibilities, challenges faced and coping mechanisms), (d) reflections and learnings (subthemes: reintegration to original roles and sense of achievement).

Conclusion

Research healthcare professionals are highly adaptable professionals equipped with core transferable skills. With the appropriate support, re‐familiarization and induction they are a valuable resource during the pandemic response.

Implications to practice

Research healthcare professionals are experienced practitioners with transferrable skills and strong sense of duty and resilience.

Induction programmes to promote recalibration to clinical settings would improve their adaptability, foster confidence and emotional well‐being.

Careful consideration is required prior to mass redeployment to ensure research continuity in both COVID‐19 and other health conditions.

Interviewing older people about their experiences of emergency hospital admission: methodology in health services research

This essay makes the case for increased use of patient-centred methodologies, which involve patients and the public, in the area of emergency admissions research in the United Kingdom. Emergency admission research has rarely made use of the patient voice when attempting to find a rate of 'inappropriate' admission for older people, instead focusing on professional viewpoints and more abstract tools. We argue for the important insights that patients and their families bring to emergency admissions research and for the need to listen to and use these voices to find more holistic responses to the issue of unplanned admissions to hospital for those aged over 65. This area of health services research is highly complex, but without involving the patient viewpoint we risk not understanding the full story of events leading up to admission and what preventative measures might have helped, and therefore we also risk developing less effective, simplistic solutions. In the face of increasing challenges to the National Health Service's ability to provide safe, effective and affordable care for older people, researchers need to listen to those with direct and longitudinal experience of their ill health and admission.

John FAV, Griffiths RA, Roberts DL. Captive Reptile Mortality Rates in the Home and Implications for the Wildlife Trade

The trade in wildlife and keeping of exotic pets is subject to varying levels of national and international regulation and is a topic often attracting controversy. Reptiles are popular exotic pets and comprise a substantial component of the live animal trade. High mortality of traded animals raises welfare concerns, and also has implications for conservation if collection from the wild is required to meet demand. Mortality of reptiles can occur at any stage of the trade chain from collector to consumer. However, there is limited information on mortality rates of reptiles across trade chains, particularly amongst final consumers in the home. We investigated mortality rates of reptiles amongst consumers using a specialised technique for asking sensitive questions, additive Randomised Response Technique (aRRT), as well as direct questioning (DQ). Overall, 3.6% of snakes, chelonians and lizards died within one year of acquisition. Boas and pythons had the lowest reported mortality rates of 1.9% and chameleons had the highest at 28.2%. More than 97% of snakes, 87% of lizards and 69% of chelonians acquired by respondents over five years were reported to be captive bred and results suggest that mortality rates may be lowest for captive bred individuals. Estimates of mortality from aRRT and DQ did not differ significantly which is in line with our findings that respondents did not find questions about reptile mortality to be sensitive. This research suggests that captive reptile mortality in the home is rather low, and identifies those taxa where further effort could be made to reduce mortality rates.