MELD-B Research Project: Meet Jim

Meet Jim

Jim is a public contributor, originally from Birmingham, but work took him to Dorset about 30 years ago and he’s been there ever since. As an engineer, IT consultant and systems analyst, he likes to understand how things work. In October 2011, Jim’s life changed dramatically. He contracted Legionnaires disease and was seriously ill in hospital for 17 nights. Having reflected on the value of his care and recovery, he wanted to give something back, to repay the debt. As an IT specialist, he felt he could help the way conditions are managed and looked for an opportunity.

After initially getting involved in a digital discovery day, Jim became aware of the Wessex ARC (Applied Research Collaboration – they support applied health and care research that responds to, and meets, the needs of local populations and local health and care systems). He has supported many research projects related to the avoidance of neurological conditions. Jim has a particular interest in ageing, dementia and frailty as it resonates with his family experience. He’s currently working with Bournemouth University on a study about early intervention to prevent falls with frail people which would protect people’s independence and lessen the burden on the NHS. Jim recognises the importance of promoting healthy living throughout our life-course and is proud to be part of work that is demonstrating benefits across Dorset’s communities.

Jim’s vision is that we should be able to do parachute jumps into our 90’s! He wants to know what’s preventing us from that and if it’s inequalities – we need to find out how to address them. Getting patients and the public truly involved in research is key to fundamentally understanding the needs and wants of a community. Jim is passionate about levelling up his local communities of Portland and Weymouth.

His interest in the MELD-B study

Meld-B is a study that Jim is currently involved in which aims to understand what influences the way people develop early multimorbidity (several long-term conditions) and the burden this places on their lives. It is the hope that if key time points are identified then interventions could be made to reduce the risks. This is a perfect fit for Jim, combining his health and social interests but also, the study intends using artificial intelligence to help connect the data so tapping into his love of technological solutions. He has a drive to help Dorset transform the delivery of healthcare through enabling digital technologies.

Finding better ways to enable all patients and public members to access information is something that Jim is keen to support, such as the use of visual methods of reporting or any other media that works. The use of people’s lived experiences gives researchers a vital context to a study. He mentioned an art project that was conducted by a Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement team that told patients’ stories of their experiences in Intensive Care. Jim said it was a powerful way to communicate important information to the public and researchers.

Jim was part of the preliminary study that led to this one and is hoping that the findings from the current phase (Meld-B) will show that an understanding can be gained into the influences of early morbidity to enable further funding to scale up the study. This would involve a much larger section of the population across the whole of the UK. The ultimate goal is to identify opportunities to prevent burdensome multimorbidity. Jim’s mission is to ensure that research helps to avoid health conditions arising through a person's life, which may increase in number and prevent a long and happy retirement. Maybe then, we can all be doing parachute jumps at 90!

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