Innovation Think Tank

Praxis Care Innovation Think Tank Terms of Reference

Praxis Care has established the Praxis Innovation Think Tank to help drive quality and innovation in our service models and practice.

Our Vision

Make Praxis Care’s services and interventions best in the world – by routinely bringing the most relevant and up to date research evidence into our service improvement and new service design activity.

Our vision is to lead the world in develop new and innovative evidence based social care and support services and interventions and training for children and adults whose behaviours challenge existing services. We will use research internally, but also disseminate this knowledge externally, to contribute to the improvement of policy, service models, training and housing design, around the world.

Structure and Membership

We have the research and innovation think tank, chaired by our patron and founder Nevin Ringland. The group includes our Professor of Social Care Gavin Davidson and senior staff from Research, Operations, Learning and Development and Governance departments.

There are 3 sub-groups chaired by operational directors focusing on:

• Learning disability and challenging behaviour
• Autism
• Personality disorder and forensic services

Initial Scope of Research

1. Identify the most contemporary relevant and authoritative research pertaining to each of these specialisms
2. Audit Praxis Care’s existing services and interventions against existing world evidence base
3. Identify Praxis Care interventions for which there is a gap in supporting evidence and initiate primary research
4. Research how best to equip staff to implement the evidence based practice – in terms of both training methodologies and ongoing development and support, to enable them to thrive in challenging working environments  
5. Investigate those issues in social care which impact on staff recruitment, development and retention.

The above approach has led to a list of research priorities, some of which are underway and listed in our portfolio of Current Projects.