How to select representative geographical areas in mental health service research

Abstract

Converting several relevant criteria into one score is a feasible approach to ranking geographical areas to assist in identifying small samples that are arguably representative. The method may be used widely in similar research, but requires the availability of reliable data on relevant selection criteria.

Predictors of moving on from mental health supported accommodation in England: national cohort study

“…The sample is fully described elsewhere. 8 In summary, users of residential care and supported housing had more severe mental health problems than users of floating outreach (primary diagnosis of psychosis: 83% residential care, 72% supported housing, 52% floating outreach) and those in residential care had the highest needs and longest contact with mental health services (mean [range] years residential care 23 [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33], supported housing 11 [5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20], floating outreach 15 [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21]…”

Intentions and experiences of effective practice in mental health specific supported accommodation services: a qualitative interview study

“…The services that participated in this survey were selected from a nationally representative sample of 14 Local Authority areas across England. The areas were systematically sampled, based on their ranking on an index score that combined measures of: local mental health morbidity; social deprivation; level of urbanicity; provision of community mental health care; provision of residential care; mental health care spend; and housing demand [22]. Services from each of the three main supported accommodation service types were approached to participate in this qualitative component of the QuEST study by contacting the first service in each area of each service type recruited to the national survey.…”

Quality of life, autonomy, satisfaction, and costs associated with mental health supported accommodation services in England: a national survey

“…We aimed to recruit a random sample of 90 services from 14 nationally representative Local Authority areas (Appendix Table 1) and a random sample of 450 users of these services. The 14 areas were selected using an index developed by Priebe at al [11] for their postal survey of supported accommodation, which ranks Local Authority areas on the basis of mental health morbidity, social deprivation, urbanicity, provision of community mental health care, supported accommodation residential care, Local Authority mental health care spend and housing demand.…”