Newcastle Health Research Partnership
- Tell us about your organisation/department/project (your aims, what you do, who you work with):
The aim of Newcastle Health Research Partnership is to enhance population health and economic prosperity through collaborative research, innovation, education and training. We work with a wide range of stakeholders and partners to achieve our mission to discover, develop and deliver research and innovation to better patient outcomes.
My role is Head of Public Partnerships, and I’m here to strategically support our 5 partners with better public involvement, engagement and participation in health research. Part of my role is to champion the value and importance of patient, carers, people and communities and amplify their voices.
- Tell us why being a Haref Ally is important for you and your organisation
Health inequalities have a disproportionate impact on different groups and populations, due to their protected characteristics or for socially excluded groups. So, we need to address this with targeted health interventions for population health which are evidence based in order to improve clinical care and outcomes. But to do health research well, we need to put public involvement at the heart of it which will ensure everyone benefits from it. Public involvement needs to be an integral part of all the health research cycle.
I don’t think we can improve public involvement and community engagement for all our communities without strengthening the VCSE sector capacity and resources to be involved in research, and this needs properly funding both for organisations and remuneration for public contributors.
- Tell us about anything that you or your organisation has done to improve how you work with ethnically marginalised communities
Newcastle Health Research Partnership and Creating Connections have worked in partnership to coordinate and deliver Patient, Public Involvement and Engagement PPIE training across North-East and North Cumbria.
The programme offers opportunities to learn how to do PPIE and participation activities effectively within research. The programme was designed and delivered with all our partners, using experts in their field, including public contributors. With sessions also having a focus on research inclusion and cultural competency, this helped embed EDI and PPIE with practitioners.
By commissioning training from the third sector their research inclusion training and cultural awareness, we have supported better links between the VCSE and practitioners. We have provided opportunities for practitioners to improve their confidence and skillset to work with seldom heard communities. This will improve ways of working between different parts of the health and care system, including communities and the third sector.
- Contact details for organisation:
Email: vicki.harris@newcastle.ac.uk
