August Seminar to Discuss Challenges and Benefits of Public and Patient Involvement in Health Economics

The Health Economic and Policy Analysis Centre in collaboration with PPI Ignite @ NUI Galway will host a seminar on the Challenges and Perspectives of Public and Patient Involvement in Health Economics Research. The event is open to researchers, academics, healthcare professionals and all with an interest in hearing about the importance of the voice of the patient in health research, particularly health economics research,  The seminar takes place on Friday, 30 August at NUI Galway.

Public and Patient Involvement (PPI) is increasingly recognised as an essential component of health research. PPI is defined as research carried out ‘with’ or ‘by’ members of the public. Health Economics provides a framework for thinking about how society should allocate its limited health resources (for example, money, staffing, equipment) to meet people’s demands and needs for health care services, health promotion and prevention. The rationale for involving patients and the public in health economics research is that it promotes research quality and relevance to service users.                                                

Supported by the Health Research Board, people attending the seminar will hear about Public and Patient Involvement from various different perspectives, including why we should have PPI in our health economics research; the researcher’s perspective; the patient’s voice in healthcare; how we can reflect and evaluate PPI, for example, how the research may have been improved through PPI; and the current state of play regarding PPI in health research from the perspective of the Health Information Quality Authority (HIQA).

Attendees will be encouraged to reflect on; Why involving patients and the public in health economics research is important? What value can PPI bring? How can PPI in health economics research be evaluated? Is there a role for the public and patients in Health Technology Assessments?

Key speakers at the seminar

• Dr Conor Teljeur, Health Information Quality Authority (HIQA) will talk about how PPI fits into the health technology assessment processes in Ireland, and the challenges.
• Kristina Staley, Director, TwoCan Associates will talk about patient involvement in research that benefits the researchers, by informing their thinking and plans, leading to better research and meets the needs of patients and carers.
• Andy Gibson, Associate Professor in PPI, University of West Leeds will talk about involving the public in health research to ensure that research questions and outcomes reflect the issues that matter to patients and the public, and to incorporate the ‘real world’ experiences of patients into how research is designed and carried out.
• Liz Goodwin, Research Fellow in Health Economics, University of Exeter will talk about a particular example of involving people with Multiple Sclerosis (MS) in health economics research, using a task-based approach to work together on a specific aspect of research design, and will share some of the lessons learned from this experience.
• Dr Rebecca Kandiyali, Research Fellow in Economic Evaluation, Health Economics Bristol will talk about lessons learnt from her own experience of PPI in trial-based economic evaluation and future directions for research and practice.
• Dr Michelle Queally, Health Economist, NUI Galway will talk about PPI in health economics research and lessons learned from two case studies.
• Dr John Cullinan, Health Economist, NUI Galway will talk about the impact and burden of Myalgic Encephalomyelitys (ME) in Ireland: developing a collaborative patient-driven research agenda and approach.
• James Larkin, Health Economist, NUI Galway will talk about integrating PPI into a Mutimorbidity (multiple health conditions) and health economics PhD programme.

Dr Michelle Queally, Lecturer in Economics, J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics NUI Galway, said: “We are very much looking forward to this seminar where we will open discussions around Public and Patient Involvement in health research, particularly health economics. We will be discussing how to build partnerships that allow the public and patients to influence the health economics research we conduct and also how we might evaluate this involvement. Our overarching aim in this seminar is to show how health economics research might be informed by PPI. We will hear from health economists’ experiences of PPI through case studies, reflect on our learnings, and make suggestions for future research practice, and frameworks that we can apply in order to evaluate what contribution PPI has made to a specific project.”

It will take place in the Institute for Lifecourse and Society (ILAS), North Campus, NUI Galway from 10:30am-3:15pm on Friday, 30 August.

For full seminar details and registration visit: www.eventbrite.ie and type in ‘Public and Patient Involvement’.

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