Career pathway
Public Involvement & Engagement
Put patients and the public at the centre of data research.
Involvement and engagement are now expected of every serious data study - a discipline in its own right, with its own methods, roles and career.
Register freeAround 6 hours, at your own pace
About this pathway
Health data research uses the records of real people. Involving those people - in setting questions, designing studies, governing access and sharing results - is no longer optional; it is written into funding requirements and, done well, makes the research better. It is also a career: PPIE lead, engagement officer, public-engagement coordinator, patient advocate.
This pathway starts with the craft. Four short HDR UK sessions cover what involvement is and how it differs from engagement, how to design engagement activities, the planning toolkit, and the pitfalls seasoned practitioners will tell you to avoid. Then it changes seat: the Research Partner Resource Hub course shows what data-enabled trials look like from the partner's side - what they are asked to do, how data is accessed and governed, how outcomes are measured. Two sessions from the PEDRI series close it: co-production as a practice deeper than consultation, and reaching the minority ethnic communities most under-represented in health data.
Roles sit in NIHR-aligned bodies, NHS research and development offices, patient organisations and disease charities, university engagement teams and research infrastructure programmes. A career typically runs from PPIE coordinator to PPIE lead towards head of patient engagement.
What you'll be able to do
- Distinguish involvement from engagement and know when each is needed
- Plan a PPIE activity using the available resources - and avoid the common pitfalls
- Understand what a research partner does in a data-enabled trial
- Apply co-production rather than consultation
- Engage under-represented communities credibly and respectfully
What's in this pathway
7 steps
Who this pathway is for
Researchers who need to build involvement into their studies; communications and engagement professionals moving into research; nurses and clinicians with a PPIE remit; and public contributors and research partners who want to understand the machinery they are part of. No technical background needed.
Ready to work towards this career?
Involvement and engagement are now expected of every serious data study - a discipline in its own right, with its own methods, roles and career.
