Community Voices in Research

Research in Suffolk and North East Essex

The ‘Community Voices in Research’ programme, funded by NHS England and developed in partnership with NHS Suffolk and North East Essex Integrated Care Board, aimed to tackle the under-representation in research among diverse groups and communities in Suffolk and North East Essex, by increasing awareness and motivation to participate in research.

Community-led organisations in Suffolk and North East Essex were funded and trained by NIHR colleagues to become community research champions. By facilitating conversations about health research amongst members of their community the aim was to:

• understand what research means to different communities.
• discover what areas of research are a priority for different communities.
• understand the barriers people face engaging in health research.
• discovering how these barriers can be overcome.

The programme enabled us to gather insight from an extensive range of communities and in total the 19 projects held over 1,000 conversations with people who face barriers to participating in research.

A range of resources to enable participation in Health and Care Research in Suffolk and North East Essex were developed and are available below.