Co-design to Support People after Stroke

Timeframe: 2016 – 2020
Funder: NIHR

Each year, over 100,000 people in the UK have a stroke (Stroke Association 2018). Dental disease is highly prevalent in the stroke survivor population, however, oral health is a relatively neglected part of stroke care. This research was funded through the NIHR Research for Patient Benefit programme. It aimed to develop a prototypical intervention to improve the oral health of stroke survivors living in the community, by supporting self-care behaviours and enabling oral care support from carers. Research to better understand the oral care needs and experiences of stroke survivors was used to identify key oral-health behaviours and, following theory on Behaviour Change, was subsequently translated into a prototypical intervention. It addresses the challenge of how to develop novel service improvements which are co-designed to ensure acceptability to patients and health care professionals, and are also based on theory and evidence. The research used the Experience-based co-design (EBCD) model for facilitating the co-design processes and used the Behaviour Change Wheel and the complimentary Theoretical Domains Framework to provide ongoing evaluation against a series of target behaviours.