Diane Fox is a Research Officer at PSSRU, University of Kent. Prior to joining PSSRU, she conducted research in the NHS, focusing on primary care and mental health services. Since joining PSSRU, she has worked with colleagues to develop the national surveys carried out by local authorities, the Adult Social Care Survey and the Carers’ Survey. More recently, she has been working on a project funded by the School of Social Care Research, using survey data to identify factors that influence the quality of life of unpaid carers. From January 2013, she will work on a new project ‘Maximising the Value of Survey Data in Adult Social Care (MAX) which is funded by the Quality and Outcomes of person-centred Care Policy Research Unit (QORU). Working in partnership with Local Authorities, the MAX project aims to develop toolkits to facilitate the analysis, interpretation and presentation of survey data.