David A. Richards, Ph.D., is the Professor of Mental Health Services Research at the University of Exeter Medical School in the United Kingdom. He runs the University‘s Complex Interventions Research Group. He is also President of the European Academy of Nursing Science. He was a professor of Mental Health at the Universities of Manchester (2003-4) and York University (2004-8). He is an expert in health services research methods including systematic reviews, clinical trials and complex interventions research methods, editor of the seminal international textbook ‘Complex Interventions in Health: An Overview of Research Methods’ (http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415703161/).
He is prominent in international efforts to improve access to treatment for those suffering from high prevalence mental health problems such as depression. This work involves developing and testing evidence based treatments, and then translating these into routine clinical environments (e.g., development and testing of psychological therapies for depression, particularly low-burden, low-intensity treatments). Dr. Richards has written over 160 peer reviewed papers, articles, books and book chapters on mental health care including the UK’s national curriculum and support materials for Psychological Wellbeing Practitioners. He is joint editor of ‘The Oxford Guide to Low Intensity CBT Interventions’ (http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199590117.do).
Dr. Richards runs a multi-centre research team funded by the UK Medical Research Council (MRC) and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), the results of which have been fundamental to the organisational, educational and low-intensity clinical methods at the heart of the UK Department of Health’s ‘Improving Access to Psychological Therapies’ (IAPT) programme from its inception in 2005. He led the development of IAPT low-intensity treatment methods and was Clinical Informatics Advisor to the IAPT programme from 2008-2011. He is also a chief investigator on two large (> 1000 patients) randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of psychological treatments and organisational management for depression, funded by the UK NIHR. He is a co-investigator on a number of other RCTs including trials of computerised treatment and older people’s depression care.
Personally, Dr Richards is motivated by strong moral and political views about societal fairness, equity and wellbeing. He believes that the benefits of scientific discovery should be equitably shared amongst all peoples of the world, independent of culture, ability, economic power or class. He and his family have been involved all their lives in trying to establish fairness and justice for those who find themselves less able to take advantage of our modern material wealth. He claims that he does not have much time for hobbies, but he does like to grow his own vegetables, surf in the Devon sea, brew craft beer and ride old motorbikes.
Selected Recent Publications
Green C, Richards DA, Hill JJ, Gask L, Lovell K, et al. (2014). Cost-Effectiveness of Collaborative Care for Depression in UK Primary Care: Economic Evaluation of a Randomised Controlled Trial (CADET). PLoS ONE 9(8): e104225. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0104225
Campbell, J.L., Fletcher, E., Britten, N., Green, C., Holt, T.A., Lattimer, V., Richards, D.A., Richards, S.H., Salisbury, C., Calitri, R., Bowyer, V., Chaplin, K., Kandiyali, R., Murdoch, J., Roscoe, J., Varley, A., Warren, F.C., and Taylor, R.S. (2014). Telephone triage for management of same-day consultation requests in general practice (the ESTEEM trial): a cluster randomised controlled trial and cost-consequence analysis. The Lancet, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61058-8.
Masterson, C., Ekers, D., Gilbody, S., Richards, D., Toner-Clewes, B., McMillan, D. (2014). Sudden gains in behavioural activation for depression. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 60: 34-38
Ekers D, Webster L, Van Straten A, Cuijpers P, Richards D, et al. (2014) Behavioural Activation for Depression; An Update of Meta-Analysis of Effectiveness and Sub Group Analysis. PLoS ONE 9(6): e100100. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0100100
Richards, D.A., Coulthard, V. and Borglin, G. (2014). The state of European nursing research: dead, alive, or chronically diseased? A systematic literature review. Worldviews on Evidence-Based Nursing, 11:147-155.
van Straten, A., Hill, J., Richards, D.A. and Cuijpers, P. (2014). Stepped care treatment delivery for depression: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Psychological Medicine, 26 March 2014; doi:10.1017/S0033291714000701
Coupe, N., Anderson, E., Gask, L., Sykes, P., Richards, D.A., Chew-Graham, C. (2014). Facilitating professional liaison in collaborative care for depression in UK primary care; a qualitative study utilising normalisation process theory. BMC Family Practice, 15:78 doi:10.1186/1471-2296-15-78
Rhodes, S., Richards, D.A., Ekers, D., McMillan, D., Byford, S., Farrand, P.A., Gilbody, S., Hollon, S.D., Kuyken, W., Martell, C., O’Mahen, H.A., O’Neill, E., Reed, N., Taylor, R.S., Watkins, E.R., Wright, K.A. (2014). Cost and outcome of behavioural activation versus cognitive behaviour therapy for depression (COBRA): study protocol for a randomised controlled trial. Trials, 15:29
O’Mahen, H.A., Richards, D.A., Woodford, J., Wilkinson, E., McGinley, J., Taylor, R.S., Warren, F.C. (2013). Netmums: a phase II randomized controlled trial of a guided Internet behavioural activation treatment for postpartum depression. Psychological Medicine, 44: 8; 1675-1689.
Richards, D.A., Hill, J.J., Gask, L., Lovell, K., Chew-Graham, C., Bower, P., Cape, J., Pilling, S., Araya, R., Kessler, D., Bland, J.M., Green, C., Gilbody, S., Lewis, G., Manning, C., Hughes-Morley, A., Barkham, M. (2013). CADET: Clinical Effectiveness of Collaborative Care for Depression in UK Primary Care. A Cluster Randomised Controlled Trial. British Medical Journal, 347;f4913 doi: 10.1136/bmj.f4913
Bower, P., Kontopantelis, E., Sutton, A., Kendrick, T., Richards, D.A., Gilbody, S., Knowles, S., Cuijpers, P., Andersson, G., Christensen, H., Meyer, B., Huibers, M., Smit, P., van Straten, A., Warmerdam, L., Barkham, M., Bilich, L., Lovell, K. and Tung-Hsueh Liu, E. (2013). Influence of initial severity of depression on effectiveness of low intensity interventions: meta-analysis of individual patient data. British Medical Journal 2013;346:f540 doi: 10.1136/bmj.f540.
O’Mahen, H.A., Woodford, J., McGinley, J., Warren, F.C., Richards, D.A., Lynch, T.R. and Taylor, R.S. (2013). Internet-based behavioural activation – Treatment for postnatal depression (Netmums): A randomized controlled trial. Journal of Affective Disorders: DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2013.03.005i
Barkham, M., Bewick, B.M., Mullin, T., Gilbody, S., Connell, J., Cahill, J., Mellor-Clark, J., Unsworth, G., Richards, D., & Evans, C. (2013). The CORE-10: A short outcome measure for core common mental health problems in routine primary care practice. Counselling and Psychotherapy Research, 13: (1); 3-13 DOI:10.1080/14733145.2012.729069
Archer J, Bower P, Gilbody S, Lovell K, Richards D, Gask L, Dickens C, Coventry P. Collaborative care for depression and anxiety problems. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2012, Issue 10. Art. No.: CD006525. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD006525.pub2. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD006525.pub2/abstract.
Barazzone, N., Cavanagh, K., Richards D.A. (2012). Computerised cognitive behavioural therapy and the therapeutic alliance: A qualitative enquiry. British Journal of Clinical Psychology 51(4):396-417. DOI: 10.1111/j.2044-8260.2012.02035.x
Richards, D.A. (2012). Stepped Care: A Method to Deliver Increased Access to Psychological Therapies Canadian Journal of Psychiatry-Revue Canadienne de Psychiatrie 57:4; 210-215.
Richards, D.A., Bower P., Pagel, C., Weaver, A., Utley, M., Cape, J., Pilling, S., Lovell, K., Gilbody, S., Leibowitz, J., Owens, L., Paxton, R., Hennessy, S., Simpson, S., Gallivan, S., Tomson, D. and Vasilakis, C. (2012). Delivering stepped care: an analysis of implementation in routine practice, Implementation Science, 7:3 (16 January 2012).
Richards, D.A. and Borglin, G. (2011). Complex interventions and nursing: Looking through a new lens at nursing research. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 48: 531-533.
Richards, D.A., & Borglin, G. (2011). Implementation of psychological therapies for anxiety and depression in routine practice: Two year prospective cohort study. Journal of Affective Disorders, 133, 51-60.
Richards, D.A., Mullan, E.G., Ishiyama, F.I., & Nakamura, K. (2011). Developing an outcome framework for measuring the impact of Morita therapy: A report from aconsensus development process. Journal of Morita Therapy, 22(2), 165-173.
Richards, D.A. and Bower, P. (2011). Equity of access to psychological therapies. British Journal of Psychiatry, 198: 91–92.
Ekers, D., Richards, D.A., McMillan, D., Bland, J.M., & Gilbody, S. (2011). Behavioural activation delivered by the non specialist: Phase II randomised controlled trial. British Journal of Psychiatry, 198, 66-72.
Ekers, D., Godfrey, C., Gilbody, S., Parrot, S., Richards, D.A., Hammond, D., & Hayes, A. (2011). Cost utility of behavioural activation delivered by the non-specialist. British Journal of Psychiatry, 199, 510-51.
McMillan, D., Gilbody, S., & Richards, D. (2010). Defining successful treatment outcome in depression using the PHQ-9: A comparison of methods. Journal of Affective Disorders, 127, 122–129.
Bennett-Levy, J., Richards, D.A., Farrand, P., Christensen, H., Griffiths, K., Kavanagh, D., Klein, B., Lau, M., Proudfoot, J., White, J., & Williams, C. (Eds.). (2010). The Oxford guide to low intensity CBT interventions. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Richards D.A. (2010). Low-intensity CBT. In: Mueller, M., Kennerley, H., McManus F., & Westbrook D. (Eds). The Oxford guide to surviving as a CBT therapist. Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Richards, D.A. (2010). United Kingdom Perspective. In: Gilbody, S., & Bower, P. (Eds). Depression in primary care evidence and practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Links
http://medicine.exeter.ac.uk/about/profiles/index.php?web_id=david_richards
http://www.researchgate.net/profile/David_Richards6