Who we are
The Organisations
CA:RING is a non-profit partnership between The University of Cambridge (Department of Psychiatry) and children’s charity Anna Freud.
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In collaboration with NIHR Applied Research Collaboration (ARC) for the East of England
Developed in partnership with D-CYPHR, which is part of the NIHR BioResource.
ExCA:RING evolved out of projects which were initially funded by Towards Turing 2.0 under the EPSRC Grant T2_15 & The Alan Turing Institute, and by UK Research & Innovation Grant MC_PC_21025 as part of Phase 1 of the DARE UK (Data and Analytics Research Environments UK) programme, which is delivered in partnership with Health Data Research UK (HDR UK) and ADR UK (Administrative Data Research UK). Current work focusing on evaluating the impact of research involvement is funded by the University of Cambridge Research Excellence Framework Impact Fund.
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The People
Dr Alisa Anokhina
Alisa is a research psychologist and the Project Lead for CA:RING. She has previously worked on a variety of projects at UCL evaluating mental health interventions for young people. Since coming to the University of Cambridge in 2021 she has been focusing on improving the quality and accessibility of Patient and Public Involvement, particularly around the use of routinely collected data in healthcare research.
Emily Bampton
Emily is our talented workshop facilitator with a strong passion for integrating the youth voice at the heart of leading health research. She has also previously worked as a Professional Youth Advisor for the UK Wellcome Trust Global Mental Health Databank Project. Emily first became interested in public involvement after personal experiences of anxiety since school and is now keen to bridge the gap between researchers and the public.
Dr Anna Moore
Anna is an Assistant Professor in Child Psychiatry and Medical Informatics at the University of Cambridge. She believes in the importance of diverse public representation and its power to make research better. Anna is the Primary Investigator on several projects intended to improve healthcare services for young people, including the i-THRIVE evaluation and Timely.
Jonathan Robinson
Jonathan is a Consultant Strategist at Anna Freud who is helping us establish CA:RING in an ethical and sustainable way. He has previously worked on establishing the Pears Family School, which helps young people with behavioural and emotional difficulties reach their full potential. Jonathan founded Impact Hub, a network of physical spaces that help people find support to start and grow social enterprises in over 100 cities around the world.
Amanda Ireland
Amanda is a Public Representative who has been working on CA:RING to help people who have, like her, experienced (at times severe) mental ill health to have better representation in healthcare research. Amanda is a former nurse who has further gained her Diploma in Applied Psychology, but is also a wife, mother and extreme crafter. She now uses her past experiences to ‘pay something back’ for the amazing help she received and to continue helping to shape services.
Phil Alsop
Phil is a Public Representative who has been helping us develop CA:RING, particularly ensuring that our materials can be easily understood by ‘regular folks’ and are tailored to their needs. He has over ten years’ experience as a public contributor and has facilitated support groups for people with bipolar illness. Phil has experienced serious mental health issues himself and is now excited at the prospect of PPI work being extended to a younger audience.
Charlotte Burdge
Charlotte is a Professional Placement student joining CA:RING from the University of Reading. She has been instrumental in helping us develop and shape our community and she is supporting our community impact assessment programme. She co-facilitates some of our workshops and helps us create materials which are interesting and engaging. Charlotte is interested in psychology and committed to promoting children and young people’s health and wellbeing through research involvement.
