Research User Group Newsletter Keele University RUG Summer newsletter 2018 | Page 4

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NEWS
NEWS
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Reflections on Success
The Faculty of Medicine
and Health Sciences User
and Carer Liaison Group
“By listening to their
input into the design
and delivery of our
research projects,
we can produce
research that will
better shape the
treatments of
the future.”
Members of staff who were determined to get the
public voice heard within Health Research and
Health Education across Keele University and
our local University Hospital set up the faculty
user carer liaison group four years ago.
The key concept being that by engaging the people
who use the health services in the development and
training of future doctors, nurses, pharmacists and
physios, we can produce a work force that truly puts
the needs of the patients first.
By listening to their input into the design and delivery
of our research projects, we can produce research
that will better shape the treatments of the future.
The group has developed their own website
sharing resources to support and nurture the active
engagement of lay members and staff across the
Faculty. Visit keele.ac.uk/health/info/fuclg for
more information.
They have even developed an animated film entitled
‘Health care is everybody’s business’ showcasing
lay members’ experiences of involvement and they
have collaboratively implemented a Faculty wide
development programme for all of its lay members.
All sessions were co-produced by lay members and
staff to ensure involvement of both throughout. The
programme is now being evaluated to measure the
outcomes to be submitted to an academic journal.
Visit vimeo.com/136700196 to see it.
EULAR Patient Research
Partner Meeting
Amsterdam 6th – 8th October 2017
by Adele Higginbottom, PPIE Project Coordinator
I am a member of the
international EULAR Patient
Research Partner group. This is
very much like our own Research
User Group, where 45 members
belong to a network of trained
patient research partners, who
can be contacted whenever
there is a need for reviewers
of scientific research projects.
Over the last four years I have
reviewed lay summaries and
been a lay member of a research
team for a European study
looking at Osteoarthritis and
have reviewed Fibromyalgia
guidelines.
This year’s programme included
looking at Quality of Life measures
in rheumatology, and discussing
Patient Reported Outcome
Measures. It was wonderful to be a part of this
international group, and I met lay
members from all across Europe
all with the same passion for the
patient voice to be heard.
I also ran a session on
communication skills, for this we
worked in small groups and did a
role play, where one member was a
lay member, one was a researcher,
the other members were observers.
The task was for each group to act
out a scenario, and then discuss
how the researcher, lay member
and patient organisation could
communicate better. This was
a unique way of looking at this
problem, and it worked very well. “It was wonderful
to be a part of
this international
group, and I met lay
members from all
across Europe.”