PPI Ignite at UL aims to transform institutional health research culture through its objectives of training and development, networking and policy change.
Objective 1 – Training and Development aims to increase the capacity of researchers to undertake and support research which fully engages with both patients and the public. This will include training new researchers in participatory research approaches; and equipping seasoned researchers with greater understanding of how PPI can enhance the relevance and impact of their work for the public. PPI Ignite UL will also provide community based training and development to build capacity among patients and the public to partner with academic and clinical stakeholders (e.g., from University Hospital Limerick and the UL Graduate Entry Medical School GP Network) in health research.
We will also include building and maintaining physical and social spaces that are conducive to PPI. For example, in addition to holding training (and networking) events on UL’s campus, we will hold events in the UL Health, located in Limerick City centre and the Clinical Education and Research Centre, developed in partnership with the University Limerick Hospital Group and is located on the campus of the hospital.
Our training and development activities will, therefore, be accessible and will increase public and health sector capacity to partner in research, leading to a greater number of these stakeholder groups participating in UL health research projects, collaborating on UL research grants, co-authoring scientific publications.
Objective 2 – Designing Network Events will bring together all significant PPI stakeholders, within the university and in the wider community, to share ideas, establish new partnerships, build on existing ones and to set priorities for partnered research projects. Through our planned networking activities, impacts will include: stronger public and patient voice in all research priority setting – including identifying patient-centred outcomes and patient/public-identified knowledge and action gaps (as opposed to researcher/curiosity based gaps).
Objective 3 – Expand PPI in UL’s policies, procedures and practices Planned activities will transform UL academic research and training culture through the systematic inclusion of PPI provisions throughout UL policies, procedures and operating practices. PPI Ignite UL, in tandem with the UL administrative and management structures, will develop/amend policies and procedures to have effective impact by immersing PPI into the culture and operations of the institute.
To summarise, following the principles of Participatory Health Research, our attention to a triple stakeholder partnership for health research is important. Building a shared knowledge about participatory research (through training and development), building relationships and, agreement about research priorities (through networking) and building institutional supports (through policy change) is an essential foundation for meaningful involvement by members of the public and patients in the co-governance of research. It is an essential foundation for creating a network of community and patient research translation champions which will lead to more timely uptake of new knowledge into individual health behaviour, clinical practice and health policy. These impacts can be captured as case studies and show cased through the UL Research Impact initiative https://www.ul.ie/research/content/research-impact.
