If you are a patient or member of the public and are keen to be involved in health research there are many ways you could be involved in CLAHRC-LNR. If you would like to be involved, or would like more information about PPI at CLAHRC-LNR, please fill out our enquiry form.

There is growing evidence that patient and public involvement (PPI) in research provides substantial benefits. These include:

• People who use health services are able to offer different viewpoints and these can help to ensure that relevant research of  importance to local communities is prioritised
• PPI can help to identify the results from research that are most important, both to people who use services and the public
• PPI can support the recruitment of people to take part in research, especially from communities that are normally reluctant to get involved
• Enthusiastic involvement can help to ensure that the results of research reach wider audiences
• PPI involvement in research with successful results can help to ensure that changes are implemented and services improved

Why get involved?

• You have personal knowledge and experience which you would like the research to take into account
• You want a chance to give something back and help influence research in order to benefit others
• You are frustrated and angry about how you or others have been treated and welcome the chance to channel those negative experiences into something potentially more positive
• You would like the opportunity to develop personal skills by learning about research and gain experience and confidence
• You want to help bring about improvements to health and social care services and treatments for yourself and others
• You want to help bring about improvements to the environment, health and wellbeing of your local community

Click  to read a brief Get Involved in Research Guide for patients, carers and the public who want to find out more about health research and how to become involved in research projects.

How can you be involved with CLAHRC-LNR?

• Being a member of a project or theme steering group - Many research projects have an advisory or steering group to help develop, support, advise and monitor the project.
• Reviewing papers/documents relating to projects and/or general CLAHRC-LNR work - You could be asked to read research proposals or research reports to make comments on them
• In helping to spread the findings of research projects to the wider community – You may like to be involved in relaying the important messages from the research back to your local community to improve local health and wellbeing

Further information on organisations which support patient involvement can be found on our "Patient and Public Involvement" section in Other Useful Links.