The Norwegian team comprise Hanne Tuntland, Marte Feiring, Oddvar Førland, Kari Hjelle, Hanne Leirbekk Mjøsund, Fanny Alexandra Jakobsen, Marianne Eliassen, Cathrine Fredriksen Moe and Hanne Leirbekk Mjøsund.
Hanne Tuntland is currently the coordinator of the Reable network. She works as a Professor (Docent in rehabilitation) at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences (100% position) and as an Associate Professor at Oslo Metropolitan University (20% position). She has a doctoral degree from the University of Bergen, a master`s degree from the University of Oslo and a bachelor degree in Occupational therapy from Oslo Metropolitan University. She has an OT specialization dealing with work with older adults and long experience as a faculty member involved in master level interprofessional educations dealing with gerontology and rehabilitation. She is a pioneer in Norwegian reablement research and has been involved in two empirical studies investigating reablement. This has resulted in several scientific articles and reports, a doctoral thesis, an edited textbook and several book chapters exploring various aspects of reablement. She has also participated in the Global Think Tank on reablement arranged by the International Federation of Ageing. Currently she is a co-editor and co-author of the reablement book.
She is a pioneer in Norwegian reablement research and has been involved in two empirical studies investigating reablement. This has resulted in several scientific articles and reports, a doctoral thesis, an edited textbook and several book chapters exploring various aspects of reablement. She has also participated in the Global Think Tank on reablement arranged by the International Federation of Ageing.
Marte Feiring is Associate Professor at the Master’s programme on rehabilitation and habilitation, Faculty of Health Science, Oslo Metropolitan University (OsloMet), Norway, where she has worked since 2011. She holds a PhD in sociology from the University of Oslo on the history of rehabilitation and a bachelors degree in Occupational Therapy from Oslo and with 10 years clinical experience. Feiring has worked for 12 years in applied sciences and has generated and co-generated about 15 million NOK. Her research projects cover historical and critical perspectives on health policies, welfare services, professional and multi-professional knowledge, rehabilitation practices and civil movements. She has published 25 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, and commissioned about 20 research reports. In addition to lecturing on the history and contemporary practices of rehabilitation including reablement, Feiring holds courses in user-involvement in research, qualitative methods, text analysis and academic writing at bachelor, master and PhD level. A particular area of interest relates to critical health and social research, where she applies sociological theories with an emphasis on French socio-cultural approaches, sociology of science as well as institutional and interactionist perspectives.
Oddvar Førland is a professor and senior researcher at the Centre for Care Research – Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. He is the chief editor of the Journal for Care Research/Tidsskrift for omsorgsforskning (Scandinavian University Press) which is an open access journal that publishes peer-reviewed articles within topics of care, caring, health and care services in the communities and municipalities, and their interaction with other services. Førland has led several research projects within the field of long-term care, elderly care and municipal health and care services. Areas of interest: Public organization and service development, implementation science, implementation of public reforms, dissemination of new knowledge, health and care service research, long-term care and elderly care, reablement, family carers, voluntary sector, trust studies and mixed-method studies.
Associate Professor/emerita Kari Margrete Hjelle has worked at the University College of Western Norway, since 1994 and has 28 years of teaching experience. She is an occupational therapist, and has worked as clinical occupational therapist in 13 years. She has a master degree from the University of Bergen, and her thesis describe the collaboration between occupational therapist and persons with spinal cord injury in hospital. Further research has been participation in society of persons with a disability, and how bachelor students develop the skills of acting through activity based pedagogy. Since 2015, Kari Margrete Hjelle´s research has been and still is focusing reablement. She has published four peer-reviewed articles describing the experiences of older persons´, relatives´ and teams´ experiences of participating in reablement service.
Kjersti Vik is Professor Emerita at the Occupational Therapy Section at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. She has a Ph.D. in Occupational Therapy from Karolonska Institutet in Sweden. Kjersti Vik have had a special interest in ageing and rehabilitation throughout her working carrier, as an OT in different at rehabilitation facilities in hospitals and in the municipality, as lecturer, writing textbooks and as a researcher. Her research are related to, ageing in general, and more specifically participation and inclusion, environment as a barrier and facilitator for participation, experience with community based health care and rehabilitation. Health professionals have acknowledged the knowledge she have developed though her research and she have been invited to give courses and lectures throughout Scandinavia. She is appointed honorary member of the Norwegian Association of Occupational Therapy.
Fanny Alexandra Jakobsen, PhD in Health Sciences, Associate Professor in Occupational therapy, at the Department of Rehabilitation Science and Health Technology, Faculty of Health Sciences at OSLOMET, Norway. Her work experience as a clinical occupational therapist includes community-based rehabilitation and reablement. Her research field is reablement, next of kin, and occupational science. Field of research include collaboration between health professionals and next of kin, and adult children’s experiences of family occupations following ageing parents’ functional decline.
Kari Jokstad is currently a public-sector PhD student at the program ‘Person-centred Health Care’ at the University of South-Eastern Norway, and she works as advisor in the municipality of Drammen.In her PhD-project Kari investigated how user-involvement is understood and practised in reablement and how user-involvement from older adults with personal experience with reablement can improve the quality of a study. Kari is educated as a physical therapist (Oslo, Norway) and has her Master of Science in ‘Organization and Management’ from Østfold University College. She has clinical experience from hospitals and community-based habilitation and rehabilitation, and extensive experience as a manager at several levels in the municipal health service. Kari’s main interest is how user participation at the individual and system level can contribute to sustainable and person-centred municipal health and care services.
Marianne Eliassen is as associate professor at the Department of Health and care Sciences, UiT the Arctic University of Norway. Marianne is a physiotherapist with experiences from research in the field of health and care services and service design, particularly regarding reablement services for older adults and stroke rehabilitation. Her methodological experiences is mainly from qualitative approaches, including interviews, focus groups, observations, co-design methodologies and reviews.
Hanne Leirbekk Mjøsund is an associate professor at Faculty of Nursing and Health Sciences, Nord University, Norway. Hanne is educated as a physical therapist (University College Lillebaelt, Denmark) and has a master of science in physical therapy (University of Southern Denmark). She has clinical experience from working in hospitals in Denmark and Norway, particularly in geriatric sections and with close collaboration with other professional groups. Hanne is particularly interested in investigating how PA can contribute to improving function and independence among older adults, and how healthcare professionals can promote PA in a meaningful way.