Stephen Puntis

My research is concerned with the complex relationship between providers of mental health services and the people who use them. It aims to understand how the structure and delivery of mental health services and how the pathways people with severe mental illness take through these services influences individuals' outcomes. I use a broad range of research methodologies, but focus on two domains.

QUANTITATIVE MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES RESEARCH

I conduct mental health services research mostly by using epidemiological cohorts and routine datasets, and apply quantitative statistical approaches to make inferences on healthcare delivery.

My current research investigates the pathways of care following treatment for first episode psychosis (FEP), and aims to understand the trajectories of individuals’ care at this period of transition between EIP and onward community mental health care, measure their immediate and long term outcomes, and develop a prognostic tool to be used as clinical decision aid when making decisions on further care for people leaving EIP.

I am also interested in delivery of mental health interventions outside of mental health services, and have evaluated mental healthcare delivery within police forces, acute hospitals, and primary care.

HEALTH DATA SCIENCE

I am interested in the use of routine healthcare data and health data science analytics within healthcare delivery. My research employs local and national linked datasets, and I currently work with a range of partners to develop natural language processing algorythms for use as service quality benchmarking in community mental health teams.