IHR Seminar: The value of theoretically informed and methodologically rigorous qualitative process evaluation – more than barriers and facilitators.

Julia Frost is a Senior Lecturer in the Third Gap research group, which explores the ways in which evidence based treatments and management strategies are used (or not) in patients’ everyday lives, and the ways in which research evidence is used, understood, and contributed to by members of the public.

The Rehabilitation Enablement in Chronic Heart Failure (REACH‐HF) intervention was developed to optimise self‐care support for people with heart failure (HF) and their caregivers. A multi‐centre randomised trial was conducted, and a qualitative process evaluation was undertaken to establish the fidelity of the intervention and characterise patients and carers observed and self‐reported responses to the intervention. Findings suggest that the effectiveness of the intervention is contingent upon optimal alignment of trial ‘elements’ and demonstrates the need for process evaluations to integrate data from multiple sources to explain in which contexts and circumstances interventions work best.