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Balancing higher education, study, family life and a professional role is a complex task for many women students. Family support, work commitments and feelings of guilt can impact on how mothers carve out time and space for family life and their studies.2 This paper draws on qualitative research with women doctoral students to examine their use of time and space. Following a narrative line of inquiry with methods of mind mapping and focused interviews, family capital was used as a theoretical lens to analyse the role the family plays in supporting access to time and space.Findings reveal factors that may act as a barrier to a woman's success and highlight certain strategies that mothers use to find time and space to study. This paper highlights the important role of economic, social, cultural and emotional capital in the family and how access to capital influences study patterns, especially in terms of 'headspace'.

Women, Higher Education and family capital: 'I could not have done it without my family!' Previous research suggests that through engagement with Higher Education (HE), mature women students experience identity change and transformation which could lead to conflict and strain on family relationships. This paper analyses the links between family support and students' feelings of success. The findings are based on qualitative research methods focusing on whether HE changes a woman's identity and reconstructs family relationships using a theoretical lens of family capital as a tool of analysis. A narrative line of inquiry was used to build detailed stories of a small group of women students and their partners. The eleven women students were selected from one Foundation degree in Early Years programme at a Further Education institution. Data was constructed using mind mapping, focused interviews and a mosaic approach of participant led research. This paper shows that HE transforms women's lives and the lives of their families. My paper contributes to knowledge on this topic through the development of a model of family capital. The paper concludes that through accessing family capital and having their studies valued by their family, women are able to minimise their feelings of guilt and be successful in their studies.

The aim of this study was to describe patients' experiences of, and preferences for, surgical wound care discharge education and how these experiences predicted their ability to self-manage their surgical wounds. A telephone survey of 270 surgical patients was conducted across two hospitals two weeks after discharge. Patients preferred verbal (n = 255, 94.8%) and written surgical wound education (n = 178, 66.2%) from medical (n = 229, 85.4%) and nursing staff (n = 211, 78.7%) at discharge. The most frequent education content that patients received was information about follow-up appointments (n = 242, 89.6%) and who to contact in the community with wound care concerns (n = 233, 86.6%). Using logistic regression, patients who perceived that they participated in surgical wound care decisions were 6.5 times more likely to state that they were able to manage their wounds at home. Also, patients who agreed that medical and/or nursing staff discussed wound pain management were 3.1 times more likely to report being able to manage their surgical wounds at home. Only 40% (107/270) of patients actively participated in wound-related decision-making during discharge education. These results uncovered patient preferences, which could be used to optimise discharge education practices. Embedding patient participation into clinical workflows may enhance patients' self-management practices once home.patient education as topic, patient participation, surgical wounds, surveys and questionnaires, wounds and injuries Key Messages• effective surgical wound care discharge education can equip patients with the necessary knowledge and skills to manage their surgical wounds at home

This article explores methodological and ethical issues of researching with children, drawing on a project exploring children’s perceptions of having a mother studying in Higher Education. While most prior research concentrates on a mother’s view of her children, this article uniquely focuses on children’s views on their mother. From analysis of the data and reflections on the research experience, the following themes emerged, the benefits and challenges of using drawing or Skype as a research method and ethical issues when working with children. Reflecting a view of children as competent and knowledgeable participants within research, I argue that children should be given opportunities to discuss a range of topics that concern them and advocate doing research ‘with’ rather than ‘on’ children. Throughout this article, the children’s and mothers’ voices are interjected to provide a narrative offering insights into family life from a child’s perspective thus revealing the impact of this research on the mother.