FIFTY FOUR DEGREES | 5 Foreword Subscribe online at lancaster.ac.uk/fiftyfour SUBSCRIBE I hope you’re feeling well. After all, none of us like being less than 100 per cent, and we know how hard it can be to cope with any illness or impediment. The future of health and healthcare is an important pillar of the work we carry out here in Lancaster University Management School and within our think tank, The Work Foundation. We have experts working on topics as wide-ranging as medical supply chains, hospital leadership styles, and the effects of waiting times on broader patient outcomes. Beyond this, we work with people with a disability and businesses to improve their access to the commercial realm, and address key issues around disabled entrepreneurs. And this is only scratching the surface. In these pages, you can read about some of the work being done within key institutions such as the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK. Michael West has been involved with the NHS for many years. His work on compassionate leadership impacts not just the staff working across hospitals in England, Wales, Ireland and even Denmark, but also patients under their care. He shows that if we are to deliver the highest quality of care possible, it is essential that there is compassion throughout the workforce delivering it – from the top down. It is at the very top that decisions are often made that affect the availability of medicines on hospital wards. Kostas Selviaridis and Nonhlanhla Dube have been part of an international project looking to improve supply chain systems and prevent medicine shortages. They have worked with the NHS and the UK Government Department of Health and Social Care, and their practical insights and advice have the potential to make real-world impact. The same is true of work being carried out by our economist Roger Prudon, who has been studying the effects of increased waiting times for mental health treatment on patients. His work uncovers impacts beyond recovery times, and with effects on both personal economic outcomes and expenditure by care providers. There is much to be gained for all concerned in Clare Rigg’s work on working women post-menopause as well. Too many women can feel forced out of the workforce due to menopause symptoms, and Clare’s project shows just how much they still have to offer – to their own benefit and to that of the companies they work for. The Work Foundation’s Aman Navani outlines work they are doing with the MS Society to likewise improve the working lives of people with multiple sclerosis. MS is a condition that can cause many health issues, but it does not have to mean the end of a working life. Problems of workplace access are also to be found among entrepreneurs with a disability. Cara Molyneux and colleagues from Lancaster’s Faculty of Health and Medicine highlight how disabled people wanting to start their own companies are not well supported, and how better backing could improve their working and personal lives. Likewise, Leighanne Higgins and Killian O’Leary have been working with organisations to help them improve accessibility for people with a disability. The marketplace can be far more accessible than it currently is, and it has been fabulous to see the impact Leighanne and Killian have had on improving that through their innovative artwork project. I am please to see two of our up and coming PhD researchers also featured in this edition. Ziyi Yang and Irina Obeada work on what could be considered the fringes of the health and healthcare sphere, but their respective pieces on stigmatisation in K-Pop fandom and on our sense of risk both provide fascinating insights. You will find much else to consider as well, and I hope this edition provides you with some positive mental stimulation – and we can consider that another small way in which LUMS is helping with improving the health of all those we come into contact with! Welcome to Issue 23 of Fifty Four Degrees. Professor Claire Leitch Executive Dean Lancaster University Management School
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