The Patient and Public Involvement platform has been busy continuing to support researchers across the Centre, as well as engaging with different audiences about asthma research. Elisabeth Ehrlich, PPI Lead, has made a video for the National Museum of Scotland’s new Science and Technology galleries on her experience of growing up with asthma and the impact of new treatments – it’s an excellent way of communicating with the general public about living with asthma and we’re very proud! Olivia Fulton, PPI Lead, was also invited by Asthma UK to speak at a funding call workshop to examine research ideas for treating severe asthma. We are pleased that Olivia has had this opportunity to meet with some of the world’s leading asthma researchers and clinicians to share her experience living with brittle asthma.
Our patient volunteers continue to offer valuable insight and support to AUKCAR platforms and programmes. Over the past few months our PPI leads have provided feedback for the development of our website and will also be giving feedback on new leaflets. Volunteers from our Patient Advisory Group are also supporting specific research projects. In particular, patient representatives have collaborated on two systematic reviews at various stages of the projects, including highlighting risk factors for exacerbations in children to consider in developing a search string (Pinnock, McClean), as well as reviewing findings and dissemination methods for a study regarding the development of asthma in women (Sheikh, Nwaru, McCleary).
We are continuing to recruit for our Patient Advisory Group – a very big thank you to Chris Griffiths and Rachael Fernandes for their recruiting efforts in London! We are pleased that they have identified more people with asthma who are interested in joining our group and we will be liaising with them to make sure they are aware of the different ways they can get involved.
If you need PPI support for your study or you would like to help with our recruitment efforts, please contact Melissa.Goodbourn@ed.ac.uk or 0131 650 4617.