Setting Housing and Health Research Priorities for Wales: Long Form Report on the USW Housing and Health Consensus Meeting

Overview: This report details the background, policy landscape, methods, analysis, and results of the Housing and Health consensus Meeting held in November 2023 and highlights the next steps for the University of South
Wales Housing and Health Centre of Excellence.

Background: In July of 2023 USW Psychology were awarded funding through the Knowledge Exchange and Innovation fund (KEIF) to establish a Housing and Health Centre of Excellence (CoE). The purpose of the CoE is to build on the growing call for research underpinning the impact of housing on health in Wales (Robets, 2023, Homes for health and well-being). It also aims to address the need for more effective collaboration across the sector, as outlined by Morgan’s (2023) Bevan exemplar report.

In November 2023 the Housing and Health Centre of Excellence convened a consensus meeting with key individuals from practice, academia, government, statutory, and third sector organisations to set collaborative research priorities for Wales. The report articulates the innovative methodological approach employed and presents the key recommendations for future research in this area.
Aims of the event: The overarching aims of the consensus day were to develop and agree research priorities for Housing and Health in Wales and to begin the process of mapping a way to address the key research questions within these areas.

Participants: Thirty-seven participants attended the event. Forty-eight per cent (48%) were researchers from across Wales including Cardiff University, University of South Wales, Welsh College of Architecture and Design, and the Open University. Thirty five percent of the delegates were from Housing Associations from across Wales (35%), Seven per cent (7%) were from Health organisations including health and social care delivery organisations. The remaining participants represented Welsh Government (4%), private businesses (4%), and
charity and third sector (2%).

Method: To achieve the aims of the event, two consensus techniques were used, both analysed using Thematic Analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006). The first consensus technique was an adapted Nominal Group Technique
(NGT; Manera et al, 2019). The NGT was used as the key method of prioritisation. The second consensus technique used was a World Café style workshop (Brown & Isaacs, 2005). This technique was employed to more fully develop and operationalise the wider priority areas identified in the NGT.

Results & Outcomes: The Nominal Group Technique resulted in the 5 priority research areas; (1) Understanding the barriers and facilitators for enabling houses and communities to support people to thrive; (2) Evidencing and measuring housing as a key driver of health inequalities (value of the home – cost, health &
wellbeing) (3) Challenges and opportunities in AI and tech – communication strategies, what works, for who, when to implement, impact on wellbeing? ; (4) Implementing systems thinking to identify ways to facilitate change – creating space for the individual in the system; & (5) Physical health needs (now and future) and matching that to housing stock. The World Café workshop led to the development of refined and operationalised definitions of each priority area as well as a series of specific recommendations drawn from the data captured during the discussions