“A distillation of the essence of our thoughts”: using found poetry as a creative approach to public engagement

Posted on June 13, 2024October 10, 2025 by Nadia Rodriguez Ceron

Dr Jessica Watson, GP and NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer, Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol with: Fiona Hamilton, poet; Terreka Baptiste, public contributor; Julie Clayton, Senior Research Associate (Patient & Public Involvement & Engagement), Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol.

Blood testing and poetry? At first sight this probably seems a strange combination. As GP and a researcher it has certainly taken me outside of my comfort zone.

As a GP I talk to patients about their blood tests every day, but it was only when I started to do research in this area that I began to get an insight into the lived experience of patients trying to navigate complex systems to get hold of their results. My qualitative research brought up themes of uncertainty and anxiety, but I felt that writing academic papers didn’t do enough to give voice to the … Read more

10 tips for improving diversity in research

Posted on April 18, 2024October 10, 2025 by capcbristol

By Julie Clayton, Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement Lead, Bristol Brain Centre and Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol, Victoria Wilson, Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement Advisor, Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol and Shoba Dawson, Senior Research Fellow in Inclusive Research, School of Medicine and Population Health, University of Sheffield

Between them, the authors have over 20 years of experience supporting patient and public involvement (PPI) in health research, and conducting research in the field. In this blog they share their top 10 tips for improving diversity in research, drawing on the insights and reflections of individuals and communities they have worked with.

The challenge

“I have a grant deadline coming up – I need to talk to a diverse group of patients!”

We … Read more

Using research evidence to work creatively with people with lived experience of domestic abuse

Posted on August 10, 2023August 10, 2023 by capcbristol

By Dr Natalia Lewis, Senior Reseach Fellow in Primary Care and Cat Papastavrou Brooks, Research Associate, Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol, and Dr Noreen Hopewell-Kelly, Research Fellow, NIHR Bristol Biomedical Research Centre

The coMforT study

The coMforT study, funded by NIHR Bristol Biomedical Research Centre, developed and tested a trauma-specific mindfulness course for women who had experienced domestic abuse and post-traumatic stress. The study, led by Dr Natalia Lewis, worked with an advisory group of six women with lived experience of domestic abuse who engaged in planning, delivering, analysing and disseminating study findings.

Developing a theatre piece about the impact of involvement in research

Once the coMforT study finished, two of the public contributors involved in it went on to co-produce a play called ‘Hard Evidence’ with support from researchers and the director of acta, a … Read more

ATHENA in the Daily Mail – is all publicity good publicity?

Posted on June 6, 2023October 10, 2025 by capcbristol

By Lorelei Hunt, Patient and Public Involvement Representative on the ATHENA Shingles Study, Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol

Doctors involved in the ATHENA shingles trial were interviewed by the Daily Mail, under the headline ‘Could taking a depression pill prevent lasting agony of shingles? Scientists launch clinical trial to examine effectiveness of treating post-herpetic neuralgia with amitriptyline‘.

We need to recruit more people to take part in this important pain prevention study, so raising awareness is a good thing. But some comments made on the newspaper’s website about the medication (amitriptyline) were unhelpful or wrong.

As the patient representative on the research team, I agreed to read through all of them. There were a lot, so this took a while! Unfortunately, many people did not read past the headline and recalled their own past, sometimes unpleasant experiences of having taken … Read more

Creating a community network to tackle inequities in end-of-life care and bereavement support

Posted on January 26, 2023January 27, 2023 by capcbristol

By Lucy Selman, Associate Professor of Palliative and End of Life Care, Palliative and End of Life Care Research Group and Centre for Academic Primary Care, University of Bristol

Serious illness and bereavement affect us all, but our experiences of them are not equal. People living in the poorest areas of the UK are less likely to get the care and support they need if they become seriously ill or a loved one dies. They are also more likely to be socially isolated and lonely – which can be made even worse by serious illness or bereavement.

The Weston-super-Mare community network for health inequities is a new collaborative research project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and led by the University of Bristol, which aims to tackle these issues, focusing on Weston-super-Mare, a seaside town in the South West that is socioeconomically … Read more

How can involvement in research support survivors of domestic abuse?

Posted on November 25, 2021October 10, 2025 by capcbristol

by Will Hunter, Communications Executive, National Institute for Health Research Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR Bristol BRC)

Hard Evidence is a theatre piece written and performed by Shass Blake and Alison Prince. It follows the story of two friends, Jan and Christine, who both have experience of domestic abuse, but are at different points in their journey to finding support. It shines light on how involvement in research influenced their individual journeys and empowered them to start helping others.

Alison and Shass met whilst taking part in the COMforT study. COMforT developed and pilot tested a trauma-specific mindfulness course for women with experience of domestic abuse and post-traumatic stress. The study, led by Dr Natalia Lewis, worked with an advisory group of six women with lived experience of domestic abuse who supported to plan, deliver, analyse, and disseminate study findings.

The play was the brainchild of … Read more

Meet the stars of Hard Evidence – a new production about public involvement in research

Posted on October 11, 2021October 10, 2025 by capcbristol

by Will Hunter, Communications Executive, National Institute for Health Research Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR Bristol BRC)

Hard Evidence, a new production developed through collaboration between public contributors to research, academics and creatives from acta community theatre in Bedminster, Bristol, highlights how getting involved with research can empower women who have experienced domestic abuse to support others in a similar situation.

Will Hunter, Communications Executive at the National Institute for Health Research Bristol Biomedical Research Centre (NIHR Bristol BRC), caught up with Shass Blake and Alison Prince who wrote the script with Ingrid Jones (acta) and will perform in the production in November. They came to the project after being involved in the CoMForT study, led by Dr Natalia Lewis at the Centre for Academic Primary Care, which developed and pilot tested a trauma-specific mindfulness course for women with experience of domestic abuse and post-traumatic stress.

Thanks … Read more

Taking part in a Fun Palace – what we did and was it worth it?

Posted on November 15, 2018October 10, 2025 by capcbristol

by Dr Mairead Murphy
Senior Research Associate
and
Dr Cindy Mann
Senior Research Associate
Centre for Academic Primary Care

The Living Well Fun Palace

Fun Palaces are annual, UK-wide, science, art and culture events run within community spaces. The ethos of the annual events is that rather than simply sharing information, they should fully engage communities in arts and science and they can be run by researchers, professionals or members of the public. For researchers, they offer an opportunity for a reciprocal exchange with members of the public to share and inform research.

We were invited by the Elizabeth Blackwell Institute to take part in a ‘Living Well’ Fun Palace at Bristol Central Library, on the weekend of 6/7 October. The theme this year was ‘Patterns’ and the aim was to bring researchers and communities together in the same space to share ideas about health and wellbeing in a … Read more

Pre-grant public and patient involvement and engagement (PPIE)

Posted on August 7, 2017July 26, 2018 by capcbristol

A partnership and panel event to support NIHR School for Primary Care Research (SPCR) FR15/16 applications

by Catherine Jameson
Senior Research Associate and Public and Patient Involvement and Engagement Coordinator
Centre for Academic Primary Care

Pre-grant public involvement is vital to relevant and successful research. It is considered the gold-standard approach. In practice, the issue is that before the grant is awarded, there are often no resources available to conduct high quality public and patient involvement (PPI).

With SPCR funding for pre-grant PPI supporting FR15/16 applications, we developed an event to carry out and promote early PPI at the Centre for Academic Primary Care. This served to achieve PPI for these rounds of SPCR applications, foster links between members of the public and researchers and establish early PPI as achievable and accepted culture.

The event comprised a public panel and parallel sessions of Partneropoly – an interactive game … Read more