Patient and public involvement in doctoral research: reflections and experiences of the PPI contributors and researcher

• Published in: Research involvement and engagement 2020-05, Vol.6 (1), p.23-23, Article 23
• Main Authors: Dawson, Shoba, Ruddock, Angela, Parmar, Veena, Morris, Rebecca, Cheraghi-Sohi, Sudeh, Giles, Sally, Campbell, Stephen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Decision making; Doctoral research; Efficiency; Funding; Health services; Impact; Medical research; Meetings; Narratives; Patient and public involvement; Reflections; Researchers; Studies; Systematic review; Verbal communication
• ISSN: 2056-7529; 2056-7529
• DOI: 10.1186/s40900-020-00201-w

There is evidence in the literature showing that involving patients and the public in health research can have a positive influence on quality, relevance and impact of research. However, patients and the public are not always involved in all stages of the research. There is often no explanation as to why they were only involved in some stages of the research and not others. Additionally, there is often no description of researchers' or PPI contributor's experiences of involvement. This also raises another issue which is a lack of recording of impact such involvement can have on the research process and the people involved in the research. In this paper, we present what PPI in a doctoral research should look like by providing a detailed description of how involvement occurred from pre-funding to dissemination stages of the research process. We provide some practical examples of how this was done and how involving patients made a difference to the research project. Finally, we present reflections from the patient and public contributors and the researcher on involvement in this project along with some recommendations for future doctoral and postdoctoral researchers considering involving public/patient contributors in their research. Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) has received considerable attention in the last two decades and working in partnership and co-design have now become a prerequisite in health services research in the UK. However, there is a lack of evidence and consistency in recording PPI and related activities. Researchers and PPI contributors are encouraged to record and reflect on the impact of PPI on research. There is significant variation in the way PPI contributors are involved, and it is often limited to some stages of the research cycle than others, without any reflections on the decision-making process for such involvement or any transferable learning. This has resulted in failure to provide a narrative of the research journey including researchers' and PPI contributors' personal reflections of involvement. Therefore, this paper provides an exemplar of what PPI in a doctoral research context should look like by providing a detailed account of how PPI was embedded in a doctoral research project, the PPI contributors and researcher's reflections and key recommendations for involving people specifically in doctoral research. A reflective approach was taken using data from PPI contributor and researcher notes, e-mail correspondence, me