Staff and students to provide psychological support service at British Transplant Games
Participants in this year’s British Transplant Games will get a helping hand from staff and students at Glasgow Caledonian University’s Department of Psychology for the second year running.
Dr Elaine Duncan and two DPsych Sport and Exercise Psychology trainees, Anna Leishman and Paul O'Flynn, have set up an online psychological support service for athletes taking part in the 2024 Games in Nottingham from August 1-4.
As well as the online service, former Glasgow Caledonian Sport and Exercise DPsych trainee Dr Sahen Gupta, who is now a lecturer at Portsmouth University, helped Dr Duncan find a further two trainee sport and exercise psychologists from his university to provide in-person support live at the Games.
Last year was the first time that competitors were able to access hands-on psychological services at the Games, thanks to Dr Duncan, who was inspired by her transplantee husband Dr David Sykes to get involved. Dr Duncan will lead the psychology support at the Games this year while her husband competes in cycling, archery, race walking and pétanque.
Two trainees from GCU's Sport and Exercise Psychology doctoral programme, Rachel Nateri and Abi Lind, worked with Dr Duncan to deliver the first integrated sports performance and wellbeing service at the British Transplant Games 2023 in Coventry.
This service was on a trial basis to see if a psychology service could be added to the existing physical therapy service coordinated by Alison Bloxham, Sheila Leddington-Wright and Lindsey Moffitt, from Transplant Sport UK Therapy Services.
From their experiences last year, Dr Duncan, her husband Dr Sykes, and trainees Rachel Nateri and Abi Lind, with input from the Transplant Sport UK Therapy Services team, wrote a research paper which has just been published in a special issue of the prestigious Frontiers in Sports and Active Living journal.
Dr Duncan is a Senior Lecturer in Psychology in the School of Health and Life Sciences and a member of the Research Centre for Health (ReaCH) Ageing Well Research Group.
The publication entitled ‘Supporting Transplant Athletes: Perspectives on Delivery of a Sports Performance and Wellbeing Service at the British Transplant Games’, offers perspectives on the challenges, case examples and recommendations for future similar service delivery.
Dr Duncan said: “It has been lovely to be able to experience the two of us working together on this project and we are continuing to do more work together on the transplant community, active living and sports for transplant recipients' health and wellbeing.
“I learned a lot about how to coordinate support at this sporting event and hope those lessons shape an improved service at Nottingham this year.”
Dr Sykes added: “I have relished the chance to apply my research skills and lived experience to work of this kind.”