Small grants.
Small grants are not intended to support local projects involving awareness raising unless there is innovation and evaluation.
Here are examples of the type of outcomes that could be expected from a small grant.
Helping professionals to support children and young people affected by parental alcohol problems: development of a website - (£5,000)
The website that has been developed is part of ENCARE, the European Network for Children Affected by Risky Family Environments. A website to support professionals working with children living with parental alcohol misuse (and/or parental domestic abuse) is the central output of ENCARE. A mini version of the website has been developed that offers more UK specific information on a range of topics. This is hosted as part of the main ENCARE website and as such will be a sustainable service.
The content of the website includes guidelines for professionals.
The UK 'mini-site' can be found at www.encare.info/uk. To avoid duplication more detail (based on UK/English literature) has been used to write the content for the main encare website. The bulk of relevant information can be found at /www.encare.info/en-GB/riskyenvironments. Both areas cover the work involved in this grant. These sites are being regularly modified, added to and disseminated.
Attentional Bias Training and Cue Reactivity among Social Drinkers - (£4,243)
The work has resulted in the following publications:
Attwood, A.S., Ohlson, C., Benton, C.P., Penton-Voak, I.S. & Munafò, M.R. (in press). Effects of acute alcohol consumption on processing of perceptual cues of emotional expression. Journal of Psychopharmacology
Munafò, M.R. & Mackintosh, B. (2008). Effects of attentional cognitive bias modification on cue reactivity for alcohol-related stimuli: Are the effects due to priming? (submitted)
On the basis of preliminary data from this grant a University of Bristol PhD studentship was secured. This work will explore further questions identified as a result of the pilot work funded by the AERC.
There has been considerable interest in the task that has been developed to measure sensitivity to facial expressions of emotion, in the context of investigating the effects of alcohol on aggression and mood, among our scientific colleagues. The results will also to be of interest to clinicians developing in cognitive-behavioural treatments for alcohol use disorders.
Development of the Strengthening Families Programme in Cardiff - (£5,000)
The original AERC funded project gave vital early impetus to further development of the Strengthening Families Programme at a local level. As a result of this we were successful in securing additional resources to expand the team leading on to local delivery of the programme. Cardiff Community Safety Partnership has allocated funding for a full-time paid co-ordinator, admin support and programme delivery costs initially up until March 2009.
Cardiff University are currently undertaking a qualitative / process study of the Cardiff Strengthening Families Programme on behalf of Welsh Assembly Government (WAG).
Developing this effective prevention programme from the start on a strong, multi-agency partnership basis has proven invaluable. SFP has provided an effective vehicle for joint working across a diverse range of organisations/professions. Families benefit from this, workers and their organisations benefit from this and ultimately communities stand to benefit too.
A pilot study of inter-agency working to reduce binge drinking and acute healthcare demand. - (£4,854)
This project has resulted in the establishment of a dedicated alcohol nurse specialist in the emergency department, with ongoing evaluation and improved links with other services, particularly the police.
The project has resulted in the following publication:
Benger J, Carter R. Could Inter-Agency Working Reduce Emergency Department Attendances Due To Alcohol Consumption? Emergency Medicine Journal. 2008.
This work has also been presented at several conferences, including the Annual Scientific Meeting of the College of Emergency Medicine during 2007, with the following published abstract:
Benger J, Carter R. Can inter-agency working reduce binge drinking and emergency department attendances? (Conference abstract). Emergency Medicine Journal 2007;24:A6.
Outcomes from this study have been used to support service development in a number of centres across the UK.